Not Me Monday

Well, it has been a while since I have participated but there have been a few goodies I feel the need to share. Unlike past times this one is ALL about me. This is something that was started by MckMama over at http://www.mycharmingkids.net/. You can stop on over there and get a few more laughs as you read what others have also NOT been up to.

So, without further ado this is what I have NOT, I repeat not done recently.

I don’t always but I do try to hang my laundry out on the clothes line in the summer. Why not take advantage of the wind and warm sunshine to dry my clothes for me? As an added bonus there is some straightening out of clothes as they hang. Not the usual crinkles that result from sitting in my hamper for who knows how many days after I pulled them out of the dryer.

Anyhow, last week I put clothes out on the line during the day, of course meaning to take them off later that night or early the next morning. Night and day come and go. Clothes are still on the line.

Night and day come and go another 2 times until I finally DID NOT manage to take them off. I mean honestly, who leaves their clothes hanging on the line not one, not two, but three days?!

You want to know the completely ironic part? THEY WEREN”T DRY! Is that not ridiculous? I still had to throw them in the dryer for a short while. (I don’t suppose their not being dry had anything to do with the fact that it had been an especially dewy few mornings and humidity was up.)

As a side note can I just say I am thankful we live on the end of a dead end street and that that corner of the house is where my line is placed? Can you imagine what my neighbors would have thought or even said to me had they seen my clothes out there for 3 days? The older lady 2 doors down would have been fit to be tied if she only knew! That woman’s clothes are on the line by 8 am at the latest and well off the line before my Beloved returns from work at 4. She would ask, as my husband jokes every now and again, “What does that woman do all day? Honestly!”

In other news I HAVE NOT been justifying my inhaling of my Beloved’s homemade salsa from the fresh tomatoes out of his garden as my daily intake of vegetables. It is completely laughable to think anyone would justify vegetable intake with salsa they are eating with chips, isn’t it? Yeah, I thought so too. Can’t blame me for trying can you? Ah, well it hasn’t deterred my salsa consumption, if you were going to ask. How is one to resist fresh homemade salsa, I ask you? It is seasonal. (You like that justification? I find that one especially hilarious. :)  )

And as a result of said salsa consumption I DID NOT attend a Jazzercise class and then contemplate joining!

Now that we are all shaking our heads and grinning, I think I’ll head off. Have a wonderful week!

Fever Ridden

It is the middle of the night, or half way through the middle of the night, and I am waiting for Katie to fall back asleep. I get a little ornery when I just fall back asleep only to be immediately awakened by her. So I thought it would be better to wait a half hour or so before hitting the hay.

Why are we up in the middle of the night? I hear you ask. Fever. Not just any fever but one that registered 103.2 on the ear thermometer. I had already given her some Motrin and was waiting to see if it would kick in. When I took her temperature again and got that number I just whispered, "Would you like to take a bath?" Up came my sweet little girl and away we went to cool down.

Like the other two kids, whenever I have had to pull them out of bed due to higher temperatures that are making me nervous, she enjoys and is a doll when taking middle of the night baths. She was all smiles and played for about a half hour in the water. You would never have known it was 2 am or that she had a raging fever. What a blessing that they have all taken this abuse from me with a smile!

This has been a battle in our house for 12 days and counting. It was 12 days ago Katie started getting fevers and diarrhea. Her fevers stopped within a few days, but not the diarrhea. Two days later Isaiah threw-up, just the one time, and then his fevers went off and on for 5 days. The diarrhea still ongoing. We went to the doctor on Thursday and all was fine. No fevers. No red ears. No temperatures. Just diarrhea. She said with this stomach bug that it seems to last a week and then take a week for their little bodies to recoup.

Well, here we are just a few short days later and Katie and Kiersten (always the last child to fall sick- definitely has the strongest immunity system of all 3) broke out in fevers. What is going on? Time will tell. So tomorrow, for the second week in a row, the kids will stay home from church.

We are hoping this all passes within the next few days as we are set to take an out-of-state road trip at the end of the week. Diarrhea and long car trips do not make for a nice combination. Would you pray with me that this bugs passes? And if you have any advice or helpful tips, please, do tell!

A little lisp...

and the intended meaning of something gets a new twist. Isaiah was making me giggle this morning because he was singing the Geography Songs Kiersten has been learning. The last 2 weeks or so we have been doing the Middle East. So the song goes:

The Middle East has Israel, Iran, Iraq

Bahrain, and Yemen, Kuwait,

Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar,

United Arab Emirates

Island of Cyprus,

Jordan and Lebannon

Turkey and Syria too

15 countries of Southwest Asia

Muslims, Christians and Jews

The tune is quite catchy so one can't help but sing along. We even sing it when there is no music. In fact this weekend when Isaiah went shopping with me to Walmart we thought it was a good time to practice. :) So this morning it was no surprise he belted this song out out of nowhere during breakfast. However, as I listened carefully what I heard at the end was..."Christians, Muslims and Juice!"

Ah, that sweet little boy speech impediment/lisp type thing he still has going on. So funny and cute. It makes me smile just thinking about him singing it. Not a bad way to begin the day, if I do say so myself. :)

Kites on the Lakeshore

Labor Day weekend just seemed to be busy from beginning to end. But it was Saturday that was the highlight of the weekend. We had planned on attending the local kite festival just as we did last year. Only this year my sister-in-law and her kids were going to drive up and come with us. Well, it ended up being my sister-in-law, her 3 kids, my in-laws, and then my brother-in-law and his son. The more the merrier, right? Right.

The whole kite festival was planned around letting the 2 cousins, Kiersten and Leah, have a sleepover together. That was one of Kiersten’s birthday type ‘gifts’. Since we live an hour and a half apart it takes a bit of coordinating…that and school had already begun for both girls. It was super fun for all. And would you believe it, the girls even slept! :)

Anyhow, back to the kite festival. It was a beautiful day and the lakeshore was swarmed with a multitude of people. It is more about letting the kids get wet and have fun in the lake then the kites really. This year more so than last. The day was beautiful…but there wasn’t that much wind coming off of the lake. So the kites were sparse where the laughter and fun wasn’t.

Here are a few of the kites we did see in the air. The colors are always so beautiful!

As a good wife I felt I just simply had to get a decent picture of Bucky the Badger.

The only downside to the day was I thought I had let Katie drown. When I told you that girl was a handful I was not kidding. I swear she has 12 legs and 12 arms. So what happened? We were all playing in the sand the water and Katie was right beside me. I stopped to take a ‘quick’ picture of the sand fort the bigger kids had been working on and when I put my camera down Katie was no where to be found. I immediately yelled something to my Beloved even while I was turning around to the water and moving my feet around to feel for her little body. (The water wasn’t clear so even a foot deep and you couldn’t see the bottom of the lake.) Oh the terror! Then my Beloved spied the little bugger who had walked right under his nose to head back towards another little girls floating ducky that she simply could not get out of her head.

Can I just say how relieved and thankful I was right there and then? Then I lost it. I tried hard to keep the emotions at bay but still had to turn myself around for a few moments to get it together. That moment came back to me throughout the day, especially as I was helping my Katie girl up the ladder steps and down the slide once we were back home. It was horrible and not unlike this time some months ago.

Even after that the day still went well. The kids played fairly well with one another all afternoon. We enjoyed a scrumptious lunch together, some laughs and play time. I even managed to snap a rare photo of my Beloved's folks with the grandchildren present. If you knew my mother-in-law you would know what a feat it is to get her to pose in any picture without much arm wrestling! :) I know you are wondering...if push came to shove, yes, I could take her! :)

Hope your weekend was filled with laughter and fun family memories.

So Polite

My Beloved and I have had a few good laughs over things the Biggest Man has said the last few days.

A few nights ago Isaiah chose to go upstairs rather than eat his dinner. He was simply having none of it and I wasn't making him anything else. So up he went. I left him there for about 30 minutes and then went to check and see how he was doing. We were hanging out for a short while when my Beloved came up with the Katie girl (who had been crying/screaming at the gate at the bottom of the stairs once she became hip to where I went to).

Isaiah had already asked me to help him set up this car loop-de-loop thing he has when they came up. We were all only in the room maybe 5 minutes when he pipes up and says, "Mom & Dad could you please take Katie and go downstairs?" Or it was, "Dad & Mom could you please get out of my room and go back downstairs?" You get the gist. He said it in the politest manner.

We both completely understood the whole unspoken conversation he really just had that said, "Look here you two I just had Mom set-up my loop-de-loop and Katie is going to ruin it. So would you mind taking her and yourselves (since she only goes if you go) and head back downstairs? Please? I love you and all...but cars are serious business."

We exchanged a grin, picked up Katie and headed back downstairs.

Then today we were out on the driveway with Isaiah and he was riding his bike. When he gets one wheel caught up on the grass he can pedal but the wheel just spins in midair. We were telling him, as we have a few times before, to jump off and move his bike off the grass and he can be on his way again. So this happens, the wheel on the grass, and he is just sitting there pedaling but going nowhere. Then he says to us, "That's O.K. I am just exercising."

Oh, how both my Beloved and I were tickled with that comment! The grin and chuckle were a nice way to begin our family filled busy Saturday which you'll be hearing about soon.

Hope you had a blessed and safe Labor Day weekend! :)

So cute and yet...

such an incredible handful! My goodness my Katie girl is keeping me on my toes and somewhat exhausting me. That child is into everything known to man. Don't let that sweet little face lure you in. It is a trick I tell you, a trick!

Oh, don't get me wrong Katie is adorable and can be so sweet. But man oh man, is she ever a little spit fire and a Nosey Nancy. Right now she is causing me a multitude of headaches on the Nosey Nancy end of things. We have started school and she is so distracting. Like her sister she is a natural climber. I have alluded to this in the past.

Well, she can climb onto the dining room chairs and get to the main table now where she is frequently found trying to get her knee up and over or literally crawling across it so she can get into her 'highchair' (chair that attaches and hangs from table-no legs). You can see where this is leading when I tell you that is where Kiersten and I do 90% of school time.

Katie is up there trying to grab Kiersten's book, rip the paper of one thing or another and just generally causing a lot of mayhem and madness where none is welcome. I tell you it is hard enough to get Kiersten to focus while the others get to play that Katie is adding a whole other dimension I am just not appreciating.

Today in an effort to restrain little Miss Nosey Pants I had to put a gate up between the kitchen and dining room and bring up the fold out table. That way Kiersten could work in the kitchen without sister sally climbing all over and onto her and her school work. Good grief!

See that little grin? The minx one, as we call it. It just screams I am a handful and up to no good. Now if only all her antics end up in my losing some weight....