what i did today

Another boring morning here.  Last night was somewhat eventful though.  We had a couple and their two kids over last night.  This is P&T whom we’ve been friends with for years but only recently got back in touch with.  Years ago we were pretty active with them but they were struggling financially and emotionally and it took a toll on Scott and I to be friends with them.  It sounds bad, but it was the kind of thing if they didn’t hear from you every 72 hours, they thought we weren’t their friends anymore.  Any little thing that was said that could be construed was.  They had a general negative outlook on life at the time.  They eventually left our church and we altogether lost contact with them.  In the past few months Scott has been talking to P and they came over a few weeks ago and we had a great time together.  Hence, we planned last night’s dinner which was also very nice.  So in the past few years, they have become pretty successful in their home business.  They own 3 houses at the moment, several cars, they just had a baby last year and all of that plus finding a church they fit in with and are active in has led them to be at a better place emotionally (and financially, of course).  So now they can be themselves without a chip on their shoulder or whatever it was.  You aren’t tip toeing around them now and they are really fun to be around actually.

 So after they left when the kids were in full-whine mode, I left for the gym and Scott handled bath time and bed time.  By the time I got home at 8:45, both kids were asleep in bed.  Nice.  Fantastic, in fact.  I watched So You Think You Can Dance and a little of The Office and then went to bed.  That’s about it for last night.

Today Scott is off helping with the church with  VBS block party probably until early afternoon.  The girls are at their last day of camp and my mom is planning to get them later.  I have no plans really except tomorrow is Scott’s birthday and I may make him a pie (he doesn’t care for cake) tonight and maybe plan a lunch tomorrow with his family when he wakes up from working tonight since he has to work every night this weekend.  Who knows.  Maybe his mom will decide to have a big dinner/cake thing after church Sunday.

OK, so much for boring, this evening was busy.  The girls went to MIL’s house as the normal Wednesday afternoon custom.  Around 4 Scott and I headed to D&D’s house to see the new and improved house.  They had moved into the very old house of Mr. D’s grandmother who is now in an assisted living place.  Well, the gutted the whole thing except for the hardwoods and added on a master suite.  The house rocks now.  Mrs. D (ok, that sounds weird calling her Mrs because she’s only a year older than me and my best friend)  has great taste and it’s simply beautiful.  They stained the pine floors very dark.  The kitchen has the whole dark maple, goldish countertops and stainless steel appliances.  All the rooms are coordinated with great lighting, etc, etc. 

So after that Scott dropped me off at the church for me to host week 2 of our bible study.  We were off for 2 weeks for VBS and July 4th.  And then we had youth group after that of course.  And then we ended up staying and having a “brief” leaders meeting.  And THEN we had to go pick up the girls at MIL’s.  So the girls went immediately to bed as we didn’t get home until 9:30ish.

Now Scott is over talking to the neighbor and I’m on here.  Crap, I just missed Dancing with the Stars.  Rickey.org will save me.

On the book end, no more sales yet. I haven’t announced it to the entire family and friend set yet and I think Mom and Heather are waiting to see what it looks like in person before shelling out the money.  I want to talk to our music director at church but I have a notion to sell the books at an upcoming lunch fundraiser and let all proceeds of sold books go to our choir fundraiser.  We need a lot of things and I’m always up for a good cause, especially when it benefits me too lol.

My life is boring this week…I’m lovin it.  These past 3 days have felt like more vacation than any day in Maryland we had.

So last night we went to the gym where I worked my butt off (hopefully, well, stomach really) then came home and got in the pool.  Well, technically, I got my suit on to go swimming and put the kids in the pool but I was so tired I ended up just sitting in a chair watching them swim.  The rest of the night was very boring, I don’t even have the energy to write about it. 

And today I got the kids off to school and Scott is off helping the church with another church’s VBS.  So it is super quiet around here again. 

It was a quiet evening that capped a quiet day.  Scott and I went to the gym and out to eat before picking up the girls at ILs last night.  When we got home, we let the girls watch tv/play computer games before going to bed.

This morning the girls are back at camp and Scott is working on the deck.  I’m busy with work and it’s quiet again.  Not sure hwo I know how to act with all this quiet time here.

I’m really excited about my book.  I doubt anyone will be interested except family but I just love looking at it. I can’t wait to get my copy.  I’m disappointed the date is on some of the pictures and the software warned me the resolution was too low for a few of them so I’m interested to see how it turns out.  I have picked out all the pictures for the past 5 years to do a family book.  I think it will be more difficult since there are so many more pictures.  I’m also thinking of inserting some excerpts from my blog into this one.  This is like the fast, digital scrapbook for me!  This one I’m pretty sure I won’t sell but use as gifts for our parents and siblings and such.  I already do a mini photo book from Snapfish every Christmas for our parents and grandparents.  This will be like a culmination of all the years.  Now I want to go take a ton of pictures!

The girls headed to the first day of summer camp at their preschool.  Apparently they were 30 minutes late as it starts at 8:30 vs 9:00 like school did.  And they get out at 12:30 instead of 12.  That makes for a very nice, long morning working, especially since Scott is off all week and can take them since this was supposed to be the family beach trip.

So today has been work, pick up kids from school and have lunch at Taco Bell and then back to work.  MIL and FIL had to pick up Skyler from school since SIL had to work today so all 3 girls went home with them for the afternoon.  So really, this has been a quiet day around here.

Scott has been in the yard all day.  He put down paver things in the back yard that leads from the back porch to the pool deck.  They look really nice.  With the week off and quiet mornings, he should have the deck done this week, barring any rain or other hurdles.

 I’ve been in a funky place in my mind.  Reading some blogs and stories about cancer patients and other hard times.  Looked through a bunch of old pictures of the girls.  Even some all the way back to our cruise in 2000.  I was so young and that was only 7 years ago.  I’m not sure if I can verbalize how I feel except to say I’m so ready to live life now and not look back, not look forward, not look at other people’s life, just live my own and enjoy it.

One other note…my manager tells me I’ve exceeded his expectations and he’s planning to work with his boss and my contracting company to get a bill rate increase…woohoo!  What’s weird is Scott JUST asked me when I was due for a raise THIS MORNING.  Ironic, I say.

Yeah, so it’s already Saturday night.  Everything seems to be packed, or mostly packed and ready to go for early in the morning.  I think I’m ready to go home.  Finally today felt like a vacation.  It was busy but it wasn’t so hectic somehow.  I think we had finally found our grove and now it’s time to go.  I know the girls are ready to go home.  Lexi’s been saying that since 30 minutes into the road trip up here.  I mentioned today was busy…I’ve been up since about 8am and it is now 11:45pm.  Here’s what went down:

1. I got up with the girls and got them fed, etc until Mom got up then I
2. Went for a run.  Which only lasted for about a mile because it was hot and hilly roads are apparently harder to run on than on a elliptical in a cooled room.  So I finished walking home where I
3. Got ready and took the girls to the park myself while Mom and Dad went to do some shopping.  I called them after I had
4. Taken the girls to Dollar General for a treat and to McD’s for lunch.  I headed home because
5. Mom brought us steak subs home to eat.  Afterwards we
6. Went swimming at my aunt’s where she fixed us watermelon, homemade lemonade and fresh, sweet corn.  All were very yummy.  I also took some pictures of her lovely garden and began watching Big Brother 8 until Mom told us to come home because
7. We went to eat with my grandfather and his wife at a steakhouse. I was very disappointed at the overcooked, tough filet although their ribs were delicious.  We parted ways after dinner then we
8. Went to pick up my grandmother at the house and went to look at a house for sale that Mom and Dad are thinking of buying as their next investment house up here.  They had a realtor come to appraise this house tonight and said they could get twice out of it that they bought it for.  Go Mom and Dad.  So after that, Heather predicted there was a blizzard in the forecast which promptly led us to
9. Go to Dairy Queen for an ice cream snack.  Emma and Lexi thoroughly enjoyed their dipped cones while I was quite content with my peanut butter cup blizzard.  When we left there we
10. Brought the girls home and put them to bed promptly.  Mom, Grandma and I then
11. Headed out to Wal-Mart to buy our birthday presents, Emma some more earrings since hers fell out and Mom some dryer sheets.  Since then we
12. Came home, packed some more and now I’m spending sleep time writing this.

Today was a long day.  So all of that puts this vacation to an end.  The girls were very well behaved today.  I was less frazzled, feeling a little more in control of what we did together.   I’ve been quite busy with the Flickr thing. I think I have a sort of photo-journal of the week.  I hope my cell phone bill isn’t insanely high next month.  It was sort of fun taking stupid pictures of myself and things around me.  It was things I would never take pictures of with a regular camera yet all the things I stared at during the day.  No posed family shots or fake cheesy smiles (ok, maybe one or two of those).  Just objects I ran into and me in the places I found myself.  I may do that on other trips, not sure how much on a daily basis though.

So I should go to sleep since I’m going to be in the car over 8 hours tomorrow.  God, give us all lots of patience tomorrow.

Oh, by the way, my FIL has no broken bones, just a hurt knee that is bruised.  I think he’s on some pain medication but that’s all.  The wreck wasn’t his fault so he’ll get what the car is worth which is about twice what they paid for it, so all in all, it may turn out to be a blessing in disguise.

Today did NOT feel like a vacation much.  My kids are losing it which means I’m losing my sanity.  Mom and Dad went out around lunch to a local furniture store.  She called after being gone for about an hour and said we should come over with her pictures and a folder of hers.  I thought she wanted it to show my grandmother when we went over there.  Turns out we were being sent on an errand for her to show the furniture store people her stuff.  I was ill.   A furniture store is like a big playground for a 2 and 4 year old and it was MY job to keep them from breaking anything.  After about 10 minutes I simply picked up the kids and left without telling anyone.  I was not going to have any more rude looks from ANYone.  I drove the kids to a local park at a school and let them run out their energy until they were ready to go to my grandmother’s.  The visit there was nice.   Emma and Lexi put on a cute performance of songs like You are My Sunshine for her. 

After that, we went out to eat at another locally owned restaurant Hobo’s.  It’s almost a hole in the wall but it is GOOD food.  Now we are all home watching Curious George (again).  I’m putting the kids to bed right after this is over and I think Heather and I are going to the movies after that.

There are slim pickin’s here at the movie theater.  I really want to watch License to Wed but it’s not playing here.  The only thing I really want to see is Evan Almighty.  I love him in The Office and I loved Bruce Almighty.  Hopefully the mix will turn out well.  I’m desperate for any alone time which requires me to only sit and laugh so I’m sure I’ll enjoy it no matter what.