Looking through my laptop

I was looking for some pictures I took the other day with my webcam. They were some real cool clouds that were over us just before a huge but quick downpour hit us Tues morning. Then I noticed that almost all the pictures were of the the 4 youngest kids and I hadn't taken them....so I started going through them.

Trampoline time (which the bigger girls shouldn't even be on since it's breaking)

Catching their siblings

And their Dad

OK....and their mom too (to be fair)

Self portraits

Fooling around

I'm meeeelting!

I don't see myself doing too much sleeping tonight. At 12:20 it is still 90 degrees out with a feel like of 99, I'm dripping wet. I'm trying to plot a way to sleep in the swimming pool but it's not coming. I will be jumping in there very soon though.

Even with the heat I've managed to get a few things done around here. I gave the dog a bath and applied his flea medicine. (Pet Armour from Walmart) His itching has greatly decreased and I don't see any fleas on him right now. Hopefully it'll allow his skin to heal and his fur to grow back in. Now if we could just take care of Carrie's kitten. She's taken to going potty in front of the kitchen sink for some reason. I've washed it with bleach, ammonia, and bathroom cleaner yet she still goes there. Tonight I put out some black pepper in the hope of discouraging her.

Anyways after the bath and meds I painted the dresser we picked off the side of the road. It is now a shiny black enamel (from the dollar store) like Eileen and Olivia's bed. It'll probably end up in their room. Right now it's in mine while it dries thoroughly. I also scrubbed down the back wooden stairs with Oxy-Deck brightener/cleaner. (from the dollar store) It is now ready to be stained Honey Oak with some Olympic stain (from the dollar store). I then managed to paint one of the main walls in the house without too many incidents. It's the wall we call the telephone wall. It's about 3ft across and goes from the living room into the kitchen/dining room. I painted it brown with Dutch Boy's brushed suede textured paint. (from the dollar store) I'm not too sure I like the texture (it's chalky/flat) and I'm not sure how it will hold up in such a high traffic area. I spray painted the light switch cover with chrome duplicolor auto paint (from the dollar store) and I'm wishing I could use it to cover everything. lol

In case you didn't notice....the dollar store has been bery bery nice to me lately. It's a local one and can be pretty hit and miss....which also depends on which store you go to. (they have multiple locations) It's where I bought the self stick vinyl floor tiles for the addition....3 for $1. (15 cases....675 tiles) ahhh a slight breeze! At the other store I bought 10 quarts of Glidden eggshell paint...buttered sweet corn (yellow) which will cover the rest of my kitchen walls. Along with 8 quarts of Dutch Boy's granite textured paint in Ashen (blue) which I'm thinking of trying in the small bathroom (about 6x9). That'll probably be the next project once this oppressive heat subsides. I already have the molding taped. (stupid bug just flew down my shirt!!!! laptop is the only light source around so it's attracted to it/me)

Luke and Carrie are half way done with summer school. YAY! except for the fact that summer vacation will almost be over by the time they're done. Today while out I finally remembered to buy Luke's grad party invitations. So that's at the top of the todo list this week. Aug 20th seems so far away, yet I know it'll be here before I know it. With me scrambling to get things done even though I've been doing them all along.

This weekend will be busy. Saturday will be Meghan's 1st birthday party! Allison and Drew are going all out and are keeping it a secret from us. *sulks* Then Sean will be turning 4 on Sunday. We'll be keeping it very low key. So while out today I got presents for both of them and Danielle who's birthday is next month. I was hoping to add something crocheted to Meghan's present but not in this heat I'm not making it! It'll have to be a Christmas present instead.

Well I'm leaving sweaty fingerprints on the keyboard. Now that it's 90 degrees with a feel like of 101 (at 1:19am) I think I'll publish this puppy and go swimming. OK...now that I'm recovering from a slight panic attack (phone just rang...wrong number. Still can't help but think it means bad things at this hour. I'm really going to try and cool off in the pool. Looks like Sean will be joining me since he's wide awake and looking for a drink now.

I forgot

I had a funny and a milestone to share.

Some people around here have been Planking. My kids try to find someplace to plank whenever we go somewhere with a camera.

The other day I heard Sean yelling from the bathroom. Jake got up to investigate and yelled for me to come quick. I ran to the bathroom thinking something was wrong and found this....

He had been yelling....I'm planking! I'm planking! One of the younger girls ran to get the camera as I stood there laughing.

Later that day Liz passed out blow pops to everyone. Danielle came running up to me all upset that her tooth broke. I assured her it hadn't broken. That her loose tooth had fallen out. She is well on her way to the Jack-O-Lantern look with the next tooth really wiggly.

Just had to share

Quiet Saturday morning

Only because I'm the only one up at the moment. It'll get rip roaringly going here very soon, we're suppose to be out the door by 1:30 at the latest for my niece's graduation party. Is it horrible that most of my kids are trying to opt out of it? Some are camping, some are at friend's houses and Val has to work. What did I say? Val work? Yep she got a call last night that she has a job...bar tending. The town is only 15 miles from here but it's in the opposite direction of where I'm going. She's due there at 5 and the grad party starts at 2. So not entirely sure how that's all working out right now. She may have a ride from her boyfriend Matt but I think he's working on the brakes of his vehicle. (which I'd greatly appreciate since he's driving my daughter often). We have lots of time to figure it all out I suppose. lol

I haven't posted lately because I have a partial post in my draft section that I was trying to get done first from LAST weekend. It was to have lots of pictures of our trip to the beach. I finally figured I could post what's on my mind now and try to get the beach one done later.

I've been busy here. We went camping at the conference center with Della and her group. It was fun! Lots of swimming and sunburns. It enabled me to see what I'd want to pack for the summer conference in 2 wks. Also that I may want to have the car there instead of the van since the van is loud even with the new exhaust system. I have to leave by 6:30am on the weekdays (kids have to go to summer school still). While camping this week I ended up parking the van on the other side of the property so I wouldn't wake anyone. Where I parked the first night wasn't far enough away and I woke up some of Della's kids.....ooops! I also have to figure out a way to remember to pick up the school kids (or more accurately...watch the clock). I lost track of time the second day and it was 11:45 before I remembered them. They'd ended up walking and were almost home. BAD MOMMY! At least it wasn't over 90 out like the day before. Poor Carrie got a sunburn though.

Having a mini break from the house got me wanting to get back to work on it again. Unfortunately my body wasn't in full compliance with my mind. I did manage to rip out the carpeting on the addition stairs. They were gross and I was amazed at the amount of grit that was trapped under the padding. I don't ever want carpeting in my house again. All that garbage left me totally stuffed up. I was shocked when I got to the top of the stairs (ripped the carpeting from the top down, removed the padding, nailers and staples from the bottom up). I found Eileen's and Olivia's carpeting about 3/4 of the way removed and some of the padding lifted off. I asked Olivia who did it and she said they both had done it. When I asked how they manage to get it out from under their bunk beds which are massive, she said....We're strong! I guess so.

I'm still not entirely sure what I'm doing with the stairs. Ideally I'd like to paint them white then top them with some hardwood we have in the basement. The only problem is that my mind knows it's a ton of work and it would rather do something a bit more simple...like painting. It's neat to be able to finally do all this work. I've been wanting to do it for a while now. The poor girls waited years for me to redo their room. I have tons of plans for all the rooms. The problem is money and time of course. The good thing is, a lot of what I want to do, we have the stuff here for already. Although I'm not trying to get everything done before Luke's graduation party, it would be nice to have it done. That means I kind of have a deadline of a month. I don't want the kids' summer vacation to only be me doing the house and them keeping the little ones busy. So I'm trying to make sure we stop and play at times too. (Plus my body needs the break...I'm getting old! I want my 25yo body back!)

In all this I'm also trying to figure out things for the summer conference. Meals with limited resources (camping with iffy power supply), packing, costumes for a medieval themed children's day and whatnot. Right now I'm trying to crochet a chain maille hood. I found a tunic I'd LOVE to make, plus a few other things.

Well, Sean is up and wants my laptop's lap space for some reason. I need to throw laundry in and get some things done around here. If things go as planned I'll be bringing my brother's 3 kids home with us today. We wouldn't want them thinking Aunt Kim is a slob. Oh wait, I'm sure that one has already been discussed in their house. Why can't the rest of the house stay nice while I'm doing the other work!!!! Or better yet, why hasn't a self cleaning house already been invented?

Taking a break

Things are improving around here slowly but surely. Tom's been outside most of his vacation and I've hardly seen him. I'm still glad he's been home and had a great week to do what he's wanted to do. Tomorrow we're heading up to a beach on Lake Ontario. Saturday I'm pretty sure the kids and maybe a few other people may be coming over for a cookout.

Today I decided we'd hit the main living area and try to gain some semblance of order. So the living room and kitchen are improved right now. The kids then went in the pool which I was going to join them, but I see they are out now and making lunch. After lunch I'll be heading up stairs and start ripping out the carpeting on the stairs. I'm still not entirely sure what I'm going to do with the stairs after I tear up the carpeting. Val has her rug ripped out and is starting to lay tiles. Not how I would've done it but oh well...she doesn't want me to butt-in help. Liz has painted 2 walls of her room purple and is on the 2nd coat of the other walls with yellow. I'm trying to encourage Luke to start painting his ceiling and we'll paint his walls on Sunday or Monday. I have to figure out a way to get all the cobwebs out of the addition and prep the walls. It's too high up for a big step ladder and I'm not sure I'm up to using the aluminum ladder anymore. I guess I could do the main house hall and then head into my room instead....saving the addition hall until last.

I really want to get these things in order since it's been on my todo list for a long time. BUT how fair is that to the kids on their summer vacation? I wish I could clone myself into a working Kim and a fun Kim. Life would be so much easier! Well, I should go get some lunch, figure out what's for dinner tonight and the start the heavy work on the stairs. Then again, resting my eyes for a few minutes on the couch sounds nice too.

Oh what a day!

As I stated earlier in a previos post....I had lots of plans for the day...painting, carpet ripping out and maybe even laying down some tiles. It was 1pm before I finally got my fanny upstairs to work on the girls' bunkbed. Just as I started making a mess painting Liz came upstairs to start work on her room. She nonchalantly asked me...doesn't Carrie have to leave soon? Me....Leave to where? Liz...her dr's appointment. OH SHOOT! It totally slipped my mind. Must have slipped Carrie's too because she was taking a nap at the time and we had half an hour before we needed to leave. So like a smart girl I put everything away...NAW! I decided to paint as much as I could, as fast as I could. Talk about a mess!!! I was working upside down from the floor and had black enamal paint EVERYWHERE...including my body. It looked like I tried to paint with my forearms. I finished the half pint can I had just opened and tried to look as presentable as possible. I wasn't too successful.

On the way to the dr's I scratched my chin and suddenly it was pouring out blood. I felt like my dad with his blood thinners. Of course there wasn't a thing inside the car to contain it. I had blood all over my hands and it was gross. So when we pulled up I hit the trunk release, locked the doors of the car and joined Carrie to search for the paper towels I knew were in there....and I found them.

I cleaned myself up as much as I could and we went into the doctor's. Carrie had to have a sono of her thyroid done. It was a recheck of the nodule that she has aspirated in Feb of '09. We knew it was still there, it felt the same, no big deal...just an easy peasy sono. Well, you know how the story goes with Carrie...nothing is easy or straight. The dr checked things multiple times and compared films from last year to this one. Then he told us the news. She has the orignal one on the right side and it's still the same size. BUT he also found 2 other nodules on that side. AND there was one on the left side which wasn't there previously. He thinks removal of her thyroid is probably best. I'm not so sure I'm ok with being so quick about it. Carrie says...let's just get this done and over with. She hates getting them aspirated and doesn't want to have to do it on a regular basis or have to worry about it. I don't think she realizes that she'll have to take medicine for the rest of her life. Then again, I guess she already is for her diabetes and high blood pressure. In my mind it's different because the lack of thyroid meds affects how you feel a lot more. He did do a few blood tests to see if perhaps she has a certain condition (he didn't name it) that creates nodules and by taking thyroid meds it will reduce them. Either way, she will be taking meds, it's the surgery part we're not sure about right now.

So after bloodwork (she had to get stuck twice...poor thing with tiny veins) we headed out to the car. I realized I wasn't holding my keys and asked Carrie if she had them. Nope. We checked all the areas we had been in and didn't find them. My heart sunk. I knew the car was locked and it was the only set of keys we had. We get to the car and yep, all the doors are locked. No keys are to be seen so then I remembered....I probably put them down in the trunk and forgot to pick them up when we walked away. After talking to Tom it was decided we'd call Hyundai's roadside service and see if we still qualified (wasn't sure of the mileage limit of the coverage)...and we did. So she sent a locksmith out. Our 2:30 appt was now running into 5:15. Carrie and I chilled outside in some shade while we waited for the locksmith.

The locksmith got to work and wedged open the door slowly but surely. Then took a tool and tried to hit the lock switch. It would lock but wouldn't unlock. Could the car detect the door was wedged opened? I asked him if he could grab the manual lock with the tool and he did and it was unlocked. Unfortunately as soon as I pulled the handle from the outside, the alarm went off. What I didn't realize was that it also shut off the electricity to everything...including the trunk release on the door. We couldn't get into the trunk! We tried multiple things to get in there (jump wiring the trunk switch, picking the trunk lock, pulling out the backseat, trying to manually pull the backseat release IN the trunk). To say that I'm confident that my trunk is safe from burglars once they trip my car alarm is an understatement. Fortunately in conversation the locksmith mentioned that the key code written on the original invoice would all allow us to make a new key. I rifled through the glove box and found the invoice! Unfortunately he hadn't brought his key cutter because the assistance report said we had the keys, just not access to them. So he had to run to the dealership which closed within the hour, get one made and bring it back. I turned the car on, hit the trunk lock button and taaadaaaah! had my keys in hand. Her "easy peasy quick" appointment starting at 2:30, ended at 7:15 as we pulled out of the driveway.

The locksmith let me in on something as he was getting in his car. He was a spiritual man and felt more anointed that morning then most. He was also going to turn down my job but decided at the last second to accept it. He said he truly believed that God kept me in the dr's parking lot in order to save me from something. Whether it was an accident, a bad situation or whatnot he didn't know. He just knew that God thought the parking lot was a safe place and it would be best I stayed there. I let him know that he could be right because I believed that God gives me all things for my best, whether I like them or not. We then went on to have a lengthy conversation that included gov't and corporate conspiracy and such. He was an interesting person to say the least.

Carrie and I were famished since we hadn't eaten since breakfast, which we hardly ate actually. We stopped at a KFC and ordered meals. Carrie then reminded me that I was going to order us a few wings to share. So I ordered them after our meals were made. I went to pay for them and the cashier said, no, you're good! Wooohooo! Free wings!!! As we walked out the door I said to Carrie...God wanted me to stay in the parking lot all day so I could get free wings. lol

I was suppose to pick up Eileen and Olivia from my sister's but as I drove I got a headache that kept growing to the point of not being able to think straight or hardly keep my eyes open. I pulled into my parents' driveway, grabbed a cup of coffee and 3 ibuprofen, called my sister and asked her to bring them over...which she did. Thankfully the rest, coffee and ibuprofen did the trick and the headache was reduced to a dull roar shortly thereafter. We visited my parents, then ran through wegman's to pick up things for our trip to the beach. We pulled into the driveway about midnight. So much for running to the appointment and getting right back home to get some work done.

I thought I posted this before going to bed that night, but obviously didn't. So I'm posting it now.

Our backyard

Out our back door and to the left is the pool, broken trampoline, chicken coop and the basketball hoop I often use to show how deep the snow is in winter posts.

To the right is a hedgerow and another lot

On the otherside of the hedgerow is Tom's main garden...tomatoes, cukes, zucchini, yellow squash, green peppers, cabbages. What you don't see is beyond that garden and behind the garage (which is our neighbors) is another huge plot with corn and pumpkins.

Looking into the backyard from the house side of the hedgerow. The little bit of greyness next to the 2 large bushes is a bridge. We have a ditch/creek across the property which has running water in it during the wetter seasons.

At the back of the yard (but not the property) is what we lovingly refer to as Cambodia. Tom and Billy built a shelter out of logs slashed together when we first moved out here....very primitive. It was mentioned that it looked like a Cambodian hut and the name has stuck even after it was taken down and the 2 sheds were built. The lighter roof in the middle was added on afterwards and is covering a stone patio. It's where we hang out most of the summer.

Between the jeep and the chairs is our firepit for bonfires. To the right is a table we usually use when grilling on a broken down weber grill sitting on a huge log. The three chairs in the center are the ones I've spray painted last week.

Cherry tree on the left, Flag pole which sports an eagle that Tom carved on the top and a neglected green house that Billy built. Plans right now are to pay attention to this next season. The topic of how it should be rebuilt are the subject of many discussions (with MINE being the right one lol). Behind the green house is our very neglected strawberry patch. I didn't get in there and weed at all this season. We'll be digging them up, retilling the area and replanting in September. The blueberry bushes are on the right of the greenhouse. We got about 10 berries from them this year...a new record. The wildlife manage to chew the bushes almost to the ground every winter. So we'll be building something to protect them this fall.

Looking from the firepit up to the house. Three smaller gardens...my flower/weed garden, the rhubarb and then the asparagus, hops and misc other annual crops. Right now it's corn and radishes.

Taken from inside Cambodia...Sean enjoying some quiet time on the yard swing with the apple trees in the background.

Oh the plans we have...if only the contraints of time and money could be lifted.

HELLLLOOOO World Wide Web!

We've been without internet for a few days now. It's amazing how often we'd refer to something that needed the net. Go google this, look up the directions to that, see what time the other thing is happening. How did we manage to survive without all this information at our fingertips in seconds? What do people without computers do? My dad actually gets mad (since he's not a big internet user) at how presumptuous society is that everyone wants and has internet connections. Newspaper referring to their website for more details on a subject/article. News reporters that say a phone number or such to an organization they were promoting can be found on their website. I was amazed to find that my brother's phone book for the big city was purely yellow pages/business numbers. On the front cover there was a notation that residential numbers could be found at whitepages.com. So I guess you're out of luck if you don't have a computer or can go to the library.

OK...enough of that. I discovered we didn't have internet when I tried to get on here and talk about my Saturday. Drew and Allison came out and set up a tent to spend the night. I got to see Meghan for almost 24hrs!!! woohooo! The amazing thing is that I also had my camera in my possession, the battery was charged and I had an sd card...all at the same time, so I could take pictures!

Meghan went in the pool for the first time. Actually it was the first time she went in a body of water larger then the bathtub.

Hmmmm I think I like it.

Yeah, this is fun playing with my the kids.

I'm not so sure about doing this on my own momma.

Well, if you think I can do it...I'll try.

I guess this isn't so bad

You know, this is really fun!!!!

Just don't let Uncle Seanie splash me...EVER AGAIN!


Before Drew and Allison arrived I was taking pictures of all the greenness outside so I could show you Tom's awesome yard. It'll probably be the next post, later today. Right now I think I'm going to go finish painting the girls' bunk bed and rip out some carpeting.

Ahhh the glorious sound of nothingness

As exhausted as I was earlier, my day wasn't done. After cuddling with the little ones for a bit I jumped into the shower and tried scrape the paint off of me. By the time I was getting out...Sean was crying that he wanted to get in. He had the whole tub to himself since Danielle didn't want to bother getting in. While I couldn't relax a bit with him in there alone, he had a blast stretching out as much as he could.

Carrie has gotten the fixing her room bug now. She started pestering me to help her start until I finally relented. Her ceiling is now painted (she's too short to do it, even with the broom handle added to the roller) and I "spackled" her wall. I use the quotation marks because it's really a redneck spackling job. I covered the holes with multiple layers of brown packing tape. I tried it on Olivia and Eileen's walls after we discovered a pretty decent size hole we'd missed behind some drawers. I went over it with some sand paper to take the gloss off and help that paint stick to it and taaadaa! A spot that looked like it had been spackled by an amateur, so it matched the holes with real spackle on it. lol

Now everyone is in bed and the house is quiet. As tired as I am, I need to unwind before heading to bed...so here I am...listening to the clock ticking and Carrie's kitten purring next to me. I meant to wish all my Canadian friends a Happy Canada Day in my last post but it slipped my mind. Sorry. Hope it was a festive day for everyone north of the border. I now have my battery charger for my camera...so hopefully there'll be some visual aids posted in the very near future. I'd thought to post some pictures from the past non posting months but that would require me to get on the kids' computer which I'm not willing to attempt right now. Ok...guess I unwound enough. My eyelids keep trying to stay shut.

Happy Saturday everyone!

It's WHAT day?

Eileen and Olivia's room is now painted....2 coats. I just need to release and remove the painter's tape from the moulding and ceiling. Then we'll clean, organize and then mess it up again so we can lay the floor tiles.

When I finally came downstairs Tom was home. He asked me if I wanted to invite my parents out for tomorrow. I looked at him like he had 3 heads and asked WHY would we invite them out for Friday when you'll be working. He laughed at me and informed me that TODAY was actually Friday and he's now on vacaton. HUH!?! No it's not, it's Thursday. All along I've been planning on painting on Wed and Thurs, cleaning on Friday and having people over on Saturday. So it HAS to be Thursday. After finally accepting that it is indeed Friday I decided that there was no way I could get this place into liveable order, much less company order by tomorrow afternoon. I suggested we wait until next weekend when we can celebrate Tom's birthday. (the 11th), to which he agreed. YAY! I can now continue working around here, although I'm pretty stiff and slow moving at the moment. I'm afraid if I stop, I'll never finish any thing else. Especially when what I really want to do is go float around in the pool and relax. I'd probably drown if I tried to do it now, I'm so tired.

Although I'm bummed to have "lost" a day. I'm excited that Tom is now on vacation. He decided to take advantage of the long weekend and took the remainder of the week off. Not too shabby...using 4 days of vacation and getting 9 days in a row off. I'm sure most of it will be spent in the yard and garden but it's good to see him be able to relax for more then a few hours at a time.

As much as I'd love do nothing else but sit here and chat all night. I have to go pay attention to some little ones. Sean is acting up and made the comment earlier that he didn't get enough hugs today! Danielle strongly agreed. Can someone send the cleaning fairy....PLEEEEEEEASE!