Life's Little Pleasures

Today Anna Mary, Caleb, and I spent the day playing. Jacob is spending a few days with Grandad and Gramma Lou, so I figured WE needed to have some fun, too.
We went to a cool new pet store called PetLand. They have these cool little cubicles that you can go into, and they will let you play with any pet you want...well, except the ones my kids chose the first two times. "Well, these puppies have an upper respiratory infection....Um, these have diarrhea...Do you mind if I just choose a couple of puppies FOR you?" To which I said, "No prob."
Anna and Caleb had a blast playing with puppies, hamsters, watching ferrets sleep on their heads (see pic below), trying to catch the guinea pig and parakeets.

Next we were off to a little feed store/gas station in Bernalillo (that's Burn-a-lee-yo). It's run by a local New Mexican family, and although all of their dry goods look a little dusty, they always have baby chicks and ducks and birds to hold/buy in the back of the store. They just keep them in these big troughs, and the chicks and ducks get so excited when you come to pick them up. Today we were thrilled to also hold bunnies!
After that we were hungry so we stopped at good ol' McD's. After three more stops, we got home, and oh, how good it feels to take my shoes off and relax. I am on vacation until Saturday, and I am loving every minute of it!
Jacob is having a blast with my parents, and is sooo enjoying the time away from pesky siblings. haha. We all need that time, don't we?

Birthdays

Well, it arrived. You know, birthdays don't seem to wait until the day is "perfect" anymore. Growing up, every birthday was one that I counted down from a month or two earlier, getting more anxious every day, and making sure everyone in my house remembered it was getting closer.
And now? This week I remembered that, "Oh yeah, my birthday is Friday." Well, the days leading up to it were somehow not as exciting as they used to be. First of all, my kiddos are out of school for the month of April (year-round school). Wednesday, Jacob came down with Strep Throat, so I had to call out of work that night (hooray for me, boo-hoo for Jacob) to take him to Urgent Care. About 1am my sweet Anna Mary ran in the door with her grandparents from their trip to Florida! We didn't get to bed until 2am. So, yesterday Jarrod was a zombie at work, and the kids and I were zombies at home. I stayed home from work again because none of the kids felt well (again, hooray for me). Today I woke up and remembered it was my birthday. My two youngest kids have fought all morning, Jacob is still feeling crummy, and my house? Well, let's just say that...the kids are out of school.
You see, tonight we were all supposed to go out to the dinner of my choice (NOT Chuck E. Cheese!!), because I was actually given the night of off work for my birthday. We even planned for it in our new and improved budget. But, Anna is now spending the night at her cousin's house, which is good because she and Caleb won't be able to fight. Jacob is still sick, and it's no fun to go to dinner with a sick kid. I had grand plans for Anna and me to bake a magnificent cake just for the fun of it. Oh well. It's not been a BAD day. I'm just waiting for Jarrod to get off of work, and then we'll decide what to do. We can always go out another time. Who needs to celebrate 37 anyway?

You know? Chuck E. Cheese might not be a bad idea after all. At least Jarrod and I would get some "quality time alone" while the kids are playing games. heehee.

Where in the World is Anna Mary Flaming?

Do you remember the show, "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?". That tune is ringing in my head this morning. Friday morning, Jarrod and I watched our 9 year old daughter fly off to Florida with my parents for 6 glorious days!! They invited her to spend the week with her cousin, Emily, who lives in Tampa. Since Anna Mary is the only girl, and always surrounded by boys, we thought it would be such a great adventure for her. I miss her terribly, but I am so excited for her!
I remember growing up here in Albuquerque, and nearly every Summer and Christmas break my parents would put my sisters and me on the GREYHOUND BUS and send us up to Santa Fe for a week or three to spend time with MY grandparents. ( Can you even imagine putting your child on a public bus alone these days?!?!) I always loved my time up there because my Grandad would take me with him to the post office, and to his office at the Santa Fe Railway. Gramma Brown was the director of the Santa Fe Girls' Club, so during the Summer I was surrounded by tons of girls in this great old "mansion" that had been converted. It had secret rooms, trails in the hills, and....a COKE machine. Since I was the Director's Grandaughter, I got a free Coke!! Ah, the perks.
I hope that Anna Mary has wonderful memories from this trip that she will remember as fondly as I do.
And the boys? Well, suffice it to say, they are a little jealous of her, yet they understand that my parents couldn't take all of them. They will get to do some camping and fishing up in the Sangre de Cristo mountains with Grandad Doug next month! They are loving having an all-boy time, especially when I am at work. I don't know WHAT they do, and prefer it that way. All I know is that when I come home they are still alive, and the house is still standing. Growing up in a house with all girls, this is a good thing.

Melissa and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Morning

Boy, sure makes you want to read on, huh? If you don't want to, no prob. But I just have to dump it all out there.
First of all, yesterday was April Fool's Day, of course. I've never been much for the prank thing, but my kids, who definitely take after their father, ARE. So, yesterday morning at breakfast, Jacob goes to fill his cup with water at the sink and my sweet little Anna Mary had rubber-banded the sprayer and water shot across the kitchen onto my newly baked muffins, the floor, the stove, etc. (sigh). But I had to chuckle, because that is so unlike her. Then, in the afternoon during piano lessons, my Jacob was upstairs (supposedly doing homework). After lessons ended, I had to quickly get supper going, play a quick round of tetherball with Caleb, who is too cute to say "No" to, and then rush to get dressed for work. As I reach my room, Jacob says, "April Fool's Mom!! That's a good one, huh?" I look again, and he has taken my bedroom door OFF THE HINGES and put the door in the bathroom!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Does that even qualify as an April Fool's joke?!?! Needless to say, I just left it there for Jarrod to fix...I couldn't deal!

So, this morning I woke up late from having bad dreams that my teeth were falling out, and that this lady I work with was yelling at me.
6:20am- Caleb comes down the stairs and informs me that his "In the News" paper still needs to be done, so I grab my coffee and head to the computer to print out a paper on birds. I won't mention any names, but at...

6:38am- my cell phone rings, and it's a family member (not Jarrod) wanting to ask me several questions that could wait until at least 8 o'clock.

6:51am- As I rush to get dressed, this person calls again to tell me that they found something they thought was lost! I hang up, jump in the shower, throw on clothes, yell downstairs for EVERYBODY to make sure they have ALLof their proper school clothes on, as if they've never gotten ready for school before...

7:25am--"ring,ring"...it's this person AGAIN! This time I hit IGNORE, because I am really running behind. And I'm REALLY burning up inside.

7:29am--Out the door, forgetting everyone's meds, my stuff that I need for all my errands, MY COFFEE, etc.

I did manage to get the kids to school on time. Because I couldn't find a pen to write a check for school stuff, I went to Caleb's class to finish it, only to find out that I completely forgot a VERY important meeting yesterday at 10am with his speech teacher and several other important people for his annual review! So, I went to the lady's office to "touch base" with her. I ended up having to go through about 20 pages (no joke) of "stuff" such as, "What are the goals you have for your child's future? What do you envision for him as he becomes an adult?" I'm thinking, "He's SIX, people!!" My main goal for this kid is that he makes it to age SEVEN!!! ugh. So I signed my life away, and headed out 30 minutes later to run my errands before another day of piano lessons begins.

After 2 hours, I got home with all of my errands done for the day. I sat down and read a friends' blog about her losing her mother and I just began to cry. It HAS been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad morning for me. But there are others who would trade me for their heartaches in an instant. I think I'll go take a little nap and think about that.

Uncovered, Exposed, and Bare ~ And Dreams

NO! Not me! Good grief! Our souls; our hearts! That is a fear that can come from sharing about your life and blogging; especially when you know that friends of your friends are starting to read your blog. Wow!

Anyway, "On with it, man!" I haven't blogged for a few weeks and so I thought I'd sit down this evening and write a few lines about what is going on.

First, (here comes the "bare" part) Melissa and I have enrolled in Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University. (Click the link if you've been in a cave and don't know who Dave or what FPU is.) Anyway, what we're finally admitting to ourselves is that basically, we don't know how to save money or manage what what we have, for that matter. We have never been disciplined in that practice. But, we're making steps toward change. Fortunately for us, God has blessed us with incredible patience and love toward each other and we are both on the same page, admitting that we both have faults. It's been very good.

Secondly, (here comes the "exposed" part) primarily because of our lack of discipline in finances, but also due to other circumstances we are in a bad spot. We have 4 creditors that want money and they want it now! They call and we ignore the phone. We've all gotten quite good at it, sad to say. If we were in our early 20's and could know what we know now, oh my goodness! We would definitely become millionaires. No foolin'! Even so, if we were out of debt and know what we know now, we could still become millionaires, eventually. But, we're not out of debt. And right now, I don't know how we ever will be, with our current circumstances. So...

Thirdly, (finally, the uncovering) we are trying to change our circumstances. We are trying to create additional "streams of income"*. For a couple of years now, Melissa has been giving piano lessons to mostly homeschoolers in our area. Even when we moved last fall, I believe they all stayed with her and now she's even added a few more. It is our prayer that she be able to add enough students so that she can quit her part-time job at Dillard's. Please join us in that prayer.

Also, I have had the dream of having my own Custom Woodworks shop. I have built quite a bit of the furniture that is in our house and have put it on my website. Check it out if you want. I need to get some better pics of our king-sized bed on there. The ones I used were taken for the purpose of showing the paint job Melissa did in our room. I think my next step toward making this dream a reality is to get a brochure and some biz cards printed up. If anyone has any thoughts or ideas on how we can get these two businesses to really take off, please comment or email us.

Another dream Melissa has had is to open her own pie shop. Now, if any of you have ever tasted one of her pies, (or seen my gut the past few years) you know this woman can cook! I mean it. She has got some great recipes for pie and cinnamon rolls that will knock your socks off and make you loosen your belt! Thing about this dream is we can't do it in our own home due to food regulations. This brings along another dream we have...

Hey! Joseph was a man of God and a dreamer, so there!

We want to build our own Strawbale Estate. I say estate because it's not just a house. We want a ranch, some land. We want to have a horse, a cow or two, maybe some chickens. We want to go back to simple living in today's technological world! By that I mean we don't want to be pioneers and do without every modern convenience. We're glad we live in today's world, but want to do it more simple. To experience life to the full, as we see it!

Oh my! This is quickly becoming a book and didn't want to do that. I'm starting to just spew forth all of my heart and ideas. Time to reign it in for those of you who are still actually reading this.

Bottom line? Ok I'll sum it up. Please pray for us. We are in debt over our heads and want OUT! We want to live well, give well and save well! We appreciate your thoughts and prayers.

Kids!

Now THIS is what I call "Enjoying Childhood"! The poor dog goes along with anything the kids can come up with. I love seeing them smile!

TGIF?!?

Well, yesterday was quite an adventure. I got the kids off to school and thought, "Ok, just tackle the project you've been wanting to do for weeks now...paint the master bathroom!" I figured, maybe when I paint it that wonderful "Wooden Swing" color, it will no longer be freezing when I walk in, because, after all, a warm color is bound to boost the temperature of the room, right? My brain is so weird. And so, I began my day-long venture, and was moving right along when I get this phone call from the animal clinic...for the third time in a month! "Um, yes, I have a man on the other line who claims to have your dog." UGH!!!!!! I run downstairs and into the backyard, where I had JUST let Cookie out to go potty and, sure enough, the crazy dog had climbed halfway up the gate, PUSHED the fencing out just enough to squeeze through this tiny hole, and ran off to chase the garbage truck. I know this is true because the same thing happened last garbage day!! Fortunately, a kind gentleman saw Cookie going from house to house and brought him right to my house after I talked to him.
Ok, back to painting...with Cookie INSIDE. I realized that I needed to go pick up the kids from school, so I tucked everything away, got changed into decent clothes, and drove off. However, as I got about half a mile away from the house and made a left-hand turn, my rear tire nicked the median (thus proving why I don't usually try to turn into the proper lane!), and I blew the sidewall. I hobbled over to the side of the road up ahead, out of traffic and thought, "This is just great! Jarrod's in Santa Fe at work, he's staying the night at my parents' house anyway; my friend with whom I carpool was not home, and they had after-school plans, so I didn't want to bother her; my sister was not at home..." So I called Jarrod to let him know. Then I got ahold of my friend's husband and they were all at the school eating lunch with their kids, so they said they would pile everyone in and bring them home. Whew.
So, as I sat wondering what to do, I began to get mad....very mad. There were at least 20-30 cars that passed. Did anyone even see me?? Jarrod suggested that I just walk home and wait for the kids. So, as I am getting out, hazard lights flashing, obviously a damsel in distress, a police car PASSES RIGHT BY!!! UGH!!!!!!!! I stomped off toward home, and by the time I made it to my street I was in tears. I fell on the couch and just bawled!
I did manage to gather myself together before the kids got home, and my friend's husband and brother-in-law where so kind to go change the tire and bring the van home. After that, I just had to take a deep breath and remind myself that this is the stuff life is made of.
The night ended well, and the kids and I went to the Dollar movie and saw "Alvin and the Chipmunks". It was good to laugh.