The day's happenings

My plan was to wake up this morning early so the younger two and I could get over to the health department (for WIC recertification) and beat the rush so we wouldn't have to wait a million years to be seen. But, I ended up staying up till after midnight (my new bedtime is supposed to be much closer to 10) getting everything together (finding birth certificates, getting proof of income and address..., getting clothes out for the kids, getting things together for them to do if we had to wait...) so I really was not in the mood to wake up at 6:30 in the morning. We didn't manage to get over there till 10 a.m. They don't make appointments for anything there anymore, it's first come first served (I hate the new policy!!) so we sat and sat and Gigi got bored and more bored... About an hour later, they called us in. I had to sign some things, answer some questions, then we had to wait in another waiting room for awhile. They they called us in for weighing, measuring and hemoglobin check (for Eli only, Gigi was rather relieved!), then we waited some more, saw the nutritionist, waited some more, then finally got our vouchers. They really make you earn them I tell ya :) Oh well, an hour an a half later, we were free for another 6 months when Eli will have to be re-certified (Gigi will by then be too old). So that took up all of my morning.

After lunch Gigi and I went out for a mother-daughter jaunt. I thought she would like it, feel important... but all she did was grip and complain about one thing or another so I think maybe the concept is lost on her. I suppose she'd rather do other things so I won't be in such a hurry to take her anywhere in the future! We went and got some things laminated for DH for his Sabbath School class (class rosters and memory verse charts...), then we popped over to a nearby thrift store. I had very little money on me, but was able to get several really large, huge, gigantic dresses that I'll be able to take apart and re-purpose them into something for me :) I'm thinking lots and lots of aprons because I really have the bug to start wearing pretty things more often, less jeans and sweats and I don't want nice clothes to get dirty so lots of pretty and functional aprons will be nice! Here are some of my favorites: ruffly, paisley, apron from dress [pdf], slightly bizarre but functional "Lady Artisan", cute, not free, halter apron, slight ruffle apron, Christmas apron.

I went to CVS last Saturday night to take advantage of a diaper deal they had going on. Actually there were a bunch of things that were part of the deal. If you purchased $30 worth of the items, they would give you $15 back in ECBs. Good deal, but when I added $6 in diaper coupons and $1 battery coupon and a $4 off CVS coupon and $9.98 in ECBs, it was a really great deal. The only problem is that when the receipt printed off, they only gave me ECBs for the 5 Boost Smoothies that I had bought (because they were free after ECBs). So I asked the lady about it and she tried to tell me that because my coupons took the grand total under $30, that was why the ECBs hadn't printed. She even got another manager to agree with her. I didn't think so, but I walked out with my stuff, rather upset because I was sure I was supposed to get those ECBs. When I got home I looked more carefully at the receipt and it said that the amount that I had credited toward the reward was $26.97 which was the exact price of the diapers. So I saw that they hadn't given me credit for the batteries. I was elated when I figured that out because I was sure that I would be getting my ECBs :) So I called customer service and I must glow and wax complimentary about CVSs customer service. I got a really nice lady who, when she looked at my receipt on her end, saw what I was talking about and she said that my ECBs would print on my receipt the next time I shopped at CVS. So thank you CVS, it was pleasure doing business with you, I hope you get lots of business and have many happy years.

The breakdown of my transaction goes like this:

cost of 3 packs of diapers	$26.97
batteries	$5.29
subtotal	$32.26
coupons ($7.50)	$24.76
CVS $4 off $20 coupon	$20.76
used $9.98 in ECBs to pay	$10.78
get back $15 in ECBs	$-4.22

Not counting the ECBs that I used to pay with (because I had to build them up in the beginning with real money), I got 3 packs of dipes and 1 pack of 8 AA batteries for $5.76. Not bad say I!

Mount Washmore Nomore!

I'm finally getting to do some laundry!! It's been, what... a week? More maybe. But DH hooked up a sump pump to the gray water in our septic tank and is running it over to another septic tank that is on our property (was there for a trailer that the previous owners had). This is a very temporary fix, but it's allowing me to get caught up on my laundry and it couldn't have come a moment too soon. Eli was out of pocket dipes and our towels were all dirty. So I'm on my way and very relieved!

I decided that I'm very much a visual person so I found a bunch of clipart to coincide with my Flylady Control Journal and I just check off the images of what I'm supposed to do as I do them, I think that might work better than me just looking at a page full of text (yes I can read, lol).

I slept in this morning because I got to bed a few minutes later than I would have liked and then Eli woke up once and Gigi came in and said she had bad dreams and didn't want to sleep in her bed. She got in our bed, but she was too wiggly and I wasn't getting any sleep so I made a little bed for her on the floor and went back to bed.

I was really hoping that DH would go with Geo to his dentist appointment this morning, I wasn't sure how I'd handle seeing Geo in pain... but Mr. Sleepyhead decided that he'd stayed up so late last night working that he didn't want to wake up that early so I got to go... yipee [sarcastically clapping hands, jumping up and down while rolling eyes].

We didn't tell Geo that there would be shots because that would have sent him thru the roof. He would have stressed over that so much and would have made things much worse. I'm glad we chose this route. When we got in, they put the laughing gas mask over his nose (he chose orange scented) and after several minutes was starting to feel rather giddy. The dentist came in and was real friendly, donned his orange flavored rubber gloves (what they won't think of next!) and put some numbing gel on his gums. Then, while the nitrous mask was blocking his view, he snuck the syringe in and numbed him all up without him even really knowing what was happening. He did say that it was hurting, but he didn't flinch or anything.

So after a minute or so his mouth and cheek started feeling like it was falling off his face and he couldn hardly talk or swallow (it was funny in a sad sort of way). So he and I started conversing in sign language (to a point, he needs a bigger vocab) and the spit vacuum was employed so that took care of those two things. Then he started getting bored so the dental assistant went and got him a Bible Story Book from the waiting room to look at.

Finally the dentist came in and chit-chatted with him a little more. He checked the numbness of Geo's cheek and lips and introduced him to the drill (that whistled and had headlights). Well, as soon as he started drilling, Geo tensed up and said it hurt so they put the nitrous mask on again and gave him some more nummy juice and after a couple minutes tried again.

I could tell that it either hurt or was bothering him because he was tense, but then again, I am too in the same shoes. The doc reamed out a good sized hole (I didn't look too much, rather icky) and then put some medicine soaked cotton inside to kill any infection going on (he said there was drainage, I guess from some kind of infection?). Then he put the filling putty in. It was soft at first but hardened up and after an hour Geo could chew on it. He gave me some more antibiotic for Geo to take for the next 4 days and we were done with this installment.

We'll have to go back in a month or two to get a stainless cap put on. But I was so proud of Geo and I'm so happy that he won't have to worry about a hurting tooth any more! Praise God for that! They asked him if he wanted a sticker and he said he wanted three because he had a baby brother and a sister at home. They thought that was so sweet so gave him 3 little toys and 3 stickers. They really were so nice :) I thank our pastor's wife for referring them.

I have a diaper deal that I'm planning at CVS (as soon as some money that I'm expecting gets here). If all goes as planned, I should be able to get a package of dipes for $3.50 or less (that's with ECBs and coupons driving down the price). Not bad. I've gotten my mom into CVSing too and she's doing the diaper deal as well to help me stock up on some for Eli. I like cloth, it's great and all, but my dear MIL has decided that it's her mission and her passion to see her little grandson in slim and trim 'sposies. I have to say I'm not totally against the idea because my diapers have an odd smell in them that I can't get rid of and I'm tired of it. And the less laundry I have to worry about at the moment, the better. I plan to start potty training in the spring so hopefully this won't be a problem for much longer! So thank you so much Mama D, it's truly sweet of you and really appreciated!

I do feel that I had a productive day today. I got everything on my list done except for cleaning out the van (cleaned sink/counter/stove, swept floor in kitchen, made my bed, cleaned the bathroom counter and toilet, cleared off my dresser and dusted, folded and put away a load of clothes, took some clothes that I weeded out of my shirt drawer and bagged them up, got them out of my room, folded up some blankets from Gigi's makeshift bed and vacuumed our floor, did several loads of laundry, washed/put away dishes...) I have some clothes I need to fold, tho, so I'd better get to that before it's time for me to head to bed.

Just another septic Thursday

We had the septic tank pumped again yesterday so we'll be ok for the next few days (we are limiting our water usage as much as possible in the time being, covered the septic hole with a tarp...) till DH can figure out if it's the holding tank from the septic tank that's blocked or if the field lines are damaged. He'll probably rent a backhoe to make the process infinitely easier. I can't wait, can't wait till it's back to "normal" so that I can start doing laundry again. I have learned my lesson, though, that I shouldn't do laundry back-to-back-to-back like I did last week. Stresses the system. This has really served to highten my awareness of how much water I use on a daily basis and I think I'll really try to cut down when possible. My mom gave me a great idea of saving the water that usually gets wasted when waiting for the hot water to get to the other end of the house (for showers...) and use it for other things (the garden in the summer, watering house plants, flushing toilets, adding to the fish tank...) so I may try doing that.

My CVS Coup

Ok, so it's not all that much to look at, but I was rather proud.

I managed to get all 3 toothpastes and the Gatorade G2 for $0.27 out of pocket! Not bad :)

I paid $1.88 each for the toothpastes, and $1.29 for the Gatorade, but I had a $1.50 off of one and a $1.00 off of 2 coupon for the toothpaste. I paid for it with about $4.49 in Extra Care Bucks and earned back $4.29 in ECBs. That's the way to buy toothpaste!

Whatta day!

Well, I really thought I was going to bail ship and head over to Mom and Dad's, but we stuck it out here. It didn't rain an awful lot last night so we were able to flush the toilet 2 or 3 times and shared water for baths (sorry if that's tmi, but desperate times called for desperate measures and, as DH said, they used to do that in the "olden days"). I opted to wash my hair in the sink as I just don't do well washing my Rapunzel locks in a bathtub. It actually worked pretty well.

DH found out that before we can do anything to the septic system, we had to get a permit from the county health department. He called them and filled them in on the problem and they sent a guy out to check it out and bring the permit. He thinks the field lines might just be blocked because damaged lines would cause pooling on the surface and there isn't any. Who knows what the problem is, I just know it's a big problem. All my lovely Flylady routines (well not all but a lot) are going down the tube. The biggy, shining the sink and keeping dishes out of it has been steamrolled over because we're cautious to use that much water (especially after 20 or so gallons of bathwater). I had thought about doing all my laundry at the laundromat, but DH is going to try to rig up a way to get the water from the washer out the window via a garden hose. Not exactly sure how that's going to work yet, it remains to be seen. He'll be my hero (not that he's not already) if he makes that happen!

Today I was able to empty one box of junk and then took that box (plastic tote really) to Eli's dresser and pulled out some more of his clothes. I took out at least 1/3 of what was there and was able to get rid of another tote of clothes that were sitting on top of his dresser. All in all (since the beginning) I've managed to get rid of 4 large plastic totes of clothes 18m-2T! (Ok I admit it, he had way way way too many clothes!). I still need to get into Galena's room and do that to her clothes. I know that will be a blessing to her as her clothes are in terrible disarray.

Hmm, I got the kids computer settled into it's new home, redid my laundry area, weeded out the kids clothes, it's time for me to decide what my next mission is. Maybe taking down the Christmas tree? (Ok, slightly less bad than it sounds, but only very slightly, lol). Eli pulled the tree down after it had been up only about 2 days and I knew that if we put it up again, it would just come down again. So it's sitting in a jumbled heap in the corner and I've been ignoring it because there were "more important" things that I wanted to do first (and really, who loves taking the tree down?). The lights wires are going to be a headache to get untangled. If I had the money, I'd be tempted to cut them off and buy new ones. I think we'll have to figure out how to get the tree put back up so I can then disassemble it properly. That might not happen tomorrow since DH is going to have bigger fish to fry so maybe I need to have a plan B mission just in case. Um, I guess I'd really like to get my sewing corner organized and I had the thought of turning the bookcase that's behind my head so that it's back is to the wall which will open up the space. I don't know if that will be a good thing or not. I suppose if it's not cluttered, it will be ok.

Amendment

I'm making an amendment to my blog-a-day challenge. I finally decided it wasn't "loving myself" to feel so guilty about not posting so now I'm going to post as often as I can, hopefully every day, but if I miss a day, I'll just try to get it the next...

Yesterday DH told me to hold off on doing any more washing because our septic tank was full again! The field lines aren't wicking away the water from the tank like they're supposed to and so the tank was full and any water from our house really didn't have anywhere to go. That fact became grossly apparent after Geo had taken his shower last night (thankfully not during his shower) and I was washing a very small load of diapers (gotta have diapers) and the spin cycle go to be too much for it and sewage started backwashing into our lowest area which is our bathtub (gross, yuck, bleugh, ad nauseum!). Since we won't be able to do much toilet flushing today and knowing how kids are, I think I'm going to take them and flee to my parents' house in the mountains and I'm taking my laundry with me, lol. I think DH might stay here and try to get the situation fixed. First the tank is going to have to be emptied again, then he's going to rent a back-hoe and dig out the field lines (leach beds) and replace them. He'll also dig up the rest of his garden for spring and move some bushes from around the septic tank to the perimeter of the yard. Their roots seeking out moisture during the dry summer probably played a big role in the field lines' collapse. So that whole area needs to be de-planted so this doesn't happen again.

I thought I had Eli's clothes pared down to a reasonable amount and then heard Flylady saying that kids shouldn't have more than 5 pairs of play pants and a couple of dress pants. Well, that was eye-opening seeing as Eli probably has 20 pair of jeans alone, not counting corderoy, khaki and church pants. Um, I think I need to go back and try again, lol. Maybe I could do 6 pair of jeans (I like even numbers), 1 khaki, 1 tan corderoy, 1 blue corderoy and 1-2 church pants. And his shirts are another thing altogether. But if I wash every day (which won't be a chore if my loads are smaller and more manageable), I should be able to get by on much less. I'm trying to instill in the older 2 the idea of getting more mileage from their clothes. If they aren't too dirty after a day's wearing, I've told them to lay them out by their beds to put on the next day. That will also really help with the laundry. I'll see if I can't get our water bill down yet! :) And clothes that aren't washed so frequently last longer so that's good too.

Last night the kids needed to use the bathroom (the kind where you can't get by without flushing, lol), so, since I needed to run some things by the library anyway, we all bundled up and went over there and took advantage of their plumbing. I think we're going to need to get out of here pretty soon today so we don't tax the water system any further.

Oops, I did it again...

(didn't post yesterday) Well, um, I was in super hyper cleaning mode yesterday, I got something like 6 loads of clothes folded and maybe 8 loads washed, tidied the kitchen, shined my sink, did some dishes..., and culled a bunch of clothes out of Geo's overly crowded drawers. We are truly blessed to get hand me downs from their older boy cousin, but we just almost have too much. Flylady says that if the drawers are too full, it's not fun to put clothes away so I'm just keeping the nicest shirts (plus 2 really grubby ones so he can use them to paint in or play outside in the mud...) and mostly blue jeans or khaki pants and a few corduroy. I'll put them up out of the way for awhile just in case we run out of clothes between washings (like we have in the past when I wasn't FLYing) and if we don't need them, I'll put them in the "to sell" pile. Reminds me, today DH looked at a shirt I had washed last night and said "Is this clean? I just put it in the dirty clothes yesterday." I said "I washed it." He sniffed it and got a funny, surprised, happy look on his face. That was a good feeling.

Last night I went and picked up a Sunday paper and was mightily disappointed by the wimpy bundle of coupons that was in there. I hope my coupons didn't fall out somewhere. Then I folded some more clothes before bed, put food away, shined my sink, and got everything ready to take our cat in to the vet today.

Which leads me to the huge blessing of the day yesterday! I got a call from the vet that I've been talking to about having our cat Charlie spayed. There were no openings till the end of March and I was despairing at the thought of having Charlie cooped up in our laundry room for a month and a half. The lady asked me if they'd booked me in yet and I said no, but I was starting to think that I should. She said "Would you like to bring her in tomorrow? Someone cancelled." Would I??!!? Where are you located and where do I sign? LOL I was so happy.

So, after a very sleepless night (Eli is still sick and wasn't wanting to sleep as much as he usually does), I woke up at 6:30, got dressed, ate, and was out of here by 7. I thought it would take a little longer to get there than it did, but I got there at 7:30. I wasn't supposed to be there till 8. There was a mass of people bringing their pets, maybe 18-20 people crammed into the medium sized waiting room. It was rather a mad-house. But the workers seemed really nice and treated the animals with compassion. I'll have to go there again tomorrow morning, this time they want me there at 7:30 so I know that if I leave just a little before 7, I should be good (as long as there are no traffic snarls on the way).

DH told me yesterday that a lady from our church was coming over to test her air mattress in our pool to try to find an air leak. And something like that would have sent me into a tizzy in the past, fear that she might come inside my house, but this time I looked around, realized I was "only 15 minutes from clean" (a Flylady-ism) and what a great feeling that was!

Another terrific thing that happened yesterday was that I found Gigi and Eli's birth certificates. I'd misplaced them (or so I thought) and had searched and searched for them with no luck, but decided to look in a place I was almost sure they weren't and there they were. Praise God! That was an answer to prayer.

Yet another great and happy thing that happened today was that I just discovered that we're eligible to join the larger library system for our state. We used to be part of that system before we moved, but where we are right now, our library system is 2 counties wide and just doesn't have all that much. So, now we'll have access to our little local (and super convenient) library as well as the full fledged mega library system. And the closest library is only about 20 minutes away which is not all that bad. This honkin' library system is the one that my knitting buddy is a member of and I'm always jealous of the great knitting books she can get. Well no more! Hehe, doing a little happy dance.

Picture of the Day

Ha! Like I have a picture of the day, but this was a cool picture I took of an ant this summer. He actually moved this Kix ball an inch or two through tall grass. Ants really are very hardworking creatures, aren't they?

Chagrined

How could I drop the ball and forget to blog yesterday and Wednesday? I was doing so good. Here's what happened (it's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!)... I went to a Pampered Chef demonstration last night at our pastor's house (his wife was hosting) and had a really nice time, but didn't end up getting home till close to 10. Then there were some stuff like laundry and cleaning out the sink (gotta leave that sink shiny, Flylady says, lol) and I just plain forgot. But hopefully it was just the one time. I have no idea what happened Wednesday [shrugs shoulders].

Today was lovely and sunny and beautiful and is supposed to be that way for the next day or two, nice! I managed to get most of school done even tho my night schedule (going to bed at 10, up at 6:30) was really messed up by Eli waking up a couple of times to nurse ("Baba, Baba... [very plaintively] Baba"; tho he actually started saying Mama and Mommy today which was so exciting to me. He also started saying Nanana so he's trying out his Ms and Ns now [from Bs and Ds]), and Gigi waking up crying around 11:00 or so because she was coughing and it hurt. I rubbed some Vicks on her feet, not sure if it worked, but I had to try, then I let her go to bed in our bed (DH was still up working) till DH came to bed and then he moved her to a little makeshift bed on the floor. So I didn't make my 6:30 wakeup time and that kind of threw my whole day off.

I did manage to do Kelly's Mission of the day (it's another Flylady thing) which was sweep and mop the kitchen floor. I also did the dining room floor as it was in dire need. I tidied up in the bonus room some, made a little more elbow room, did some vertical stacking of boxes so that things weren't spread out all over the place. I also moved the laundry sorting bins out of site (well 1/2 of them anyway) and moved the ironing board to where they were so it's not in my way when I come out of the laundry room anymore. The bins that show have lids on them and stack so they don't look too awful. Geo got into the cleaning and started sorting his toys. I think I'll introduce him to Riley's Challenges (yet another Flylady thing), see if he can get on board with that. I think I'm going to start listing the school subjects we need to cover every day on the white board so he can see what to expect and how much more we have to accomplish before we're "done" for the day and he can go do something else. I asked him if he'd like that and he said "yes." We finished reading a book about Ben Franklin today and I learned a lot that I never knew before. He was a very interesting fellow.

It was so much easier to clean up for Sabbath since I'd been keeping up with things every day rather than saving things till Friday afternoon. The bathroom, hallway, family room and kitchen aren't too bad. Now I need to start branching out to other parts of the house, but it's very gratifying to have those places staying fairly decent on a regular basis.

For the last little while, maybe a month or two, Eli has been jumping with both feet off the ground which is very cute to watch. He has good balance too for a little squirt.

Wednesday we went to the dentist because Geo has cavities. He had some acid reflux when he was around 3 or 4 (gone now) and it played havoc on his teeth. One of the cavities was so bad that it was giving him pretty bad toothaches (which we treated with oil of oregano & olive oil on a cotton swab which he bit down on, and tylenol) so now he's on an antibiotic as the cavity went all the way to the root (ouch!) and they want to make sure there's no infection before they take care of it. He's going to have to have a pulpotomy (what they do instead of a root canal for baby teeth) in a couple of weeks. I don't look forward to that!

Yesterday the septic guy came and took care of our septic problem and now we're good to go again. Still have a plugged toilet in the laundry room, tho; he hadn't been told that we wanted him to do that and he didn't have any tools with him. That toilet is being a sticky little thorn in my side.

Our cat is in heat and the cheapest clinic around ($20 to spay a cat!) is 2 months booked out. We've been keeping Charlie (our cat, and btw, she's a she [the kids named her]) in our laundry room as there were so many boy cats hanging around the house and we didn't like the odds. But I can't imagine keeping her in there for 2 months! I'm not sure what we're going to do. I wish I'd called a long time ago before she went into heat, but it's too late now. We can't afford a regular vet so we may not have any options. We like our kitty so it's not like we want to get rid of her or anything, but we also don't want kittens (or more accurately we don't want to have to try to get rid of kittens). Poor Charlie is talking to me right now, sounds like she's saying "Hello? Hello?" as in "is anyone out there?" Poor li'l chickadee.

Plumbing woes

We've known almost from when we first moved in here that the plumbing was not quite there. The toilets seemed sluggish and finally one of the toilets refused to flush altogether so we haven't used it in quite some time. Lately the toilets have been bubbling and needing to be plunged frequently and when we are plunging the toilet, water bubbles up in the sinks (gross!). So we finally had a septic guy come check it out and he said that our field lines (that drain the water off the top when the tank gets full) are needing to be replaced. So... DH is going to see if he and a couple of guys from church (one has a back hoe) can handle that part of it and some septic guys are coming out tomorrow to pump it out which will, at least for now, allow us to resume normal water consumption (washing clothes, dishes, showers, flushing toilets... we've been doing some of this, but at least then we'll have no worries and things should work much much better!). I really can't wait to have multiple working toilets that actually flush like they're supposed to. Yehaw!

Sansa Cozy

I wanted a way to carry my mp3 player around with me so that it was accessible for me to pause it as needed, and also to keep it safe so I knitted a quick cozy. I cast on 20, knit st st in the round, till I was about an inch from where I wanted to end, then I switched to 2x2 ribbing. I attached a belt loop on the back as well as a belt loop loop (if I'm not wearing a belt, I can still loop it thru my belt loop and button it on, if that makes any sense at all). Here's how it turned out (I should have a pic of me actually wearing it):

A day at Grandma's

DH and I had a meeting we had to go to down in the big city so we took the kiddos to Grandma's for the day and did they ever have a ball. They didn't want to leave and wondered why we weren't just spending the night there, lol. I'm glad they had a good time.

I got a new toy today :) I "bought" a new mp3 player (mine is refurb'ed so much cheaper than list price!) on scarf credit (meaning as soon as I get a scarf made and sold to cover the cost, I'll pay my parents back for it). It's something I can put Geo's composer study music on so we can listen to it for school, books in mp3 format from Librivox, and it's also something that I can put a whole bunch of motivational (home organization, home economizing, homeschool, kids, family, marriage, devotional...) podcasts on and listen to while I blitz around the house beautifying it and removing layers, trying to get rid of some of the evidence that a passel of kids live here. (LOVE the kids, hate the mess!)

Oh too, my mom said she went down to her local paper and asked about coupons and the lady said she could come on Thursday and look thru what was left before it got hauled away. Mom was pretty sure they have coupons in them. I'm so excited about that! I think I need to check with our local paper and see if they'd do the same for me. And my loving brother gets a free paper that has some coupons in it which he's saving for me. I'm on my way!! :) (Thanks for everyone's help!)

Coupon glee

I waited all day to run down and pick up a couple of Sunday papers for the coupons. I ended up with only 3 coupon flyers, 2 SmartSource and 1 Valassis. I'm not sure if that was a mistake or not. Hmm. I've decided that for now I won't cut all the coupons out, I'll just to to the pack that I need a coupon from and get it from there (Couponmom.com makes it easy to find coupons, as does MoneySavingMom.com). Eventually I'd like to put together a coupon binder like some I've seen on other blogs (using trading card sleeves for my see-thru coupon organizational pouches). Unfortunately it seems that all the good CVS deals are calling for coupons from a few weeks back, before I was getting coupons so I'll just have to wait a few weeks till I have amassed enough of my own. I spent $3.50 on 2 newspapers, we'll see if that was a good investment or not, I think it will pay off eventually by creating overages at CVS. I think my CVS day will be Tuesday altho I did hear a rumor that CVS might be clearancing and reorganizing their makeup on Thursday so maybe I should also check then. It's thought that some of the makeup could me marked down to 90% off. That I could handle! I also heard about Cheerios coupons being back by the blood pressure cuffs at certain stores (not just CVS) and since we do eat the Honey Nut variety, they would come in very handy. Hey, if I'm going to be buying them anyway, why not pay less? Sounds like a plan to me!

My mom sent me a post about putting Vicks on feet helping with annoying coughs (which Geo is afflicted with at the moment) so I tried it, I'll see if it makes a difference come morning.

Well, it's past my bedtime, gotta run.

Where did THAT come from?

We were all doing fine, healthy, happy, (minus a broken arm and toothache pain) when out of no where Eli got a runny, stuffy nose and Geo is dealing with a cough. Can't think that we've been around anyone who was sick. It was so sudden and unexpected. Poor Eli can't breath well at night so he didn't sleep well last night and hence, neither did I. But I did get a lovely nap this afternoon to make up for it :)

Fire?!? No, Thank God!

After I brought a very soggy baby Eli into the bonus room to dry him off after his bath, I noticed a strange smell, but couldn't pinpoint it. Geo distracted me with toothache pain (we can't get him in to the dentist till Wednesday, poor little chickadee!), and when DH came in a little later, he said "what's burning?" I said I didn't know, that I had smelled something funny too but couldn't place it. He checked the stove, nothing there (rice cooking but was ok), then he went back into the bonus room and happened to glance at our space heater plug which had gotten half pulled out of the outlet and the outlet was starting to flair up. He caught it just in time, praise God! It's a scary thought about what a few more minutes could have done. All night, all day, Angels watching over me, my Lord... Whew!

It's potluck tomorrow at church so I made some guacamole out of some 33 cent avocados (can you tell I think that's a good price? LOL) that I had bought from Aldi last week sometime. They were lovely! Hope the guacamole does them justice.

Happy of the day: My friend Wendy came over for a visit, haven't seen her in awhile and it was nice to just stop what I was doing for awhile and chat. Got my house relatively straightened (swept, vacuumed, things put away, lots of clean folded clothes put away, sheets changed...) for Sabbath which is always a nice feeling. Learned a little more about CVS and started getting my plans together for next week's shopping (after getting the Sunday paper & coupon inserts of course, lol). Did a couple more rows on my shawl, knitting's always nice :)

Grr of the day: Seems like the kids were determined to hurt each other today, it was always something. First Gigi hauled off and clocked Geo in the head (accidentally of course) and he made a terrific scene about it too. Then later the 2 olders were playing and Gigi kept running into things and hurting herself (once she hit her head on a doorknob [still can't figure that one out] and other times she hurt her legs running into things in the living room).

I looked high and low for a newspaper recycling drop-off place, they were all over the place where we used to live, but, alas, none around here. I was hoping to score a few coupon booklets.

This morning I tried to get Eli to go back to sleep when he was done nursing (around 6:45 a.m.), but around 7:30 or so, a groggy DH came down and asked if Eli could just get up since he had no intention of sleeping. I said ok, but that always means I can't get as much done (folding clothes with a toddler who wants to "help?" You must be crazy!). Later he wanted to know why I hadn't emptied the dishwasher and I told him I was trying to stay as quiet as possible (knowing he can hear a pin drop in Chicago). He told me it wasn't a big deal, if it was a problem he would say something about it, that it's fine. So that part isn't actually a grr because it's cart blanche to do whatever I think needs doing in the morning. Kinda nice really. Thanks sweetie :)

New Schedule

I've been trying out a new schedule and so far I really like it. It would work a lot better if my house was better sound insulated, but it's still good. In the past I stayed up way too late, upwards of 12 or 1 a.m. and then I'd sleep in as long as the kiddos would let me which would sometimes vary. Sometimes Eli would wake up at 7:30 and that would be it for the morning, no more sleeping. And this is on top of him waking me up several times during the night to nurse.

Well, now I'm going to bed as close to 10 p.m. as I can and waking up at 6:30 to nurse Eli, then putting him back in his bed for some more sleep and getting up, going to the other side of the house, folding any clothes that need folding (have to keep my tasks quiet as DH has bat ears and can apparently hear thru walls! and he works late into the night so I try to let him sleep in a little), eating my breakfast, maybe doing some filing or sorting in the bonus room... Then when the kids get up around 8:00 I can start in with school, reading Bible to them while they eat their breakfast, then after breakfast, on to nature study and math... The 2 days that I've actually been doing this have gone so well. I love not having to do school ALL DAY because we didn't get started till 9 or 10. I think Geo is more motivated to plug right along because he knows if we get school out of the way in the morning (to very early afternoon), then he has the rest of the day to "play" (play on the computer, ride his "new" bigger bike [18" wheels up from his 16" bike], crochet or knit, play piano, play with his sister...) and he really does like that. And I like it because I have the whole afternoon to do more housework (Flylady stuff, right now I am just babystepping tho, not quite flying yet, but soon!), knit, shop, whatever I feel like doing. It's great :)