How does it feel to lose 5 teeth in two weeks?

wa





Well, I have to hand it to her, Brooke has had quite the two weeks with losing her FIVE teeth. She REALLY did not want us NEAR her mouth. She would inform us that we could pull her 5 loose teeth "TOMORROW."

Well, of course, her whole mouth of lose teeth made her two front teeth cross over each other and look REALLY odd. The teeth would all bleed on a regular basis.

So, I pulled four of them when she thought I was going to give her hugs for a bump she got...and as MEAN as it sounds....

As I went to give her hugs better, since she was crying ANYWAY, and since she was not expecting it.... I took those opportunities to tug them. IS THAT TRULY DECEITFUL????

Then we clapped for her and made her try to feel really good about what just happened. It worked, especially when we got out the container for the tooth fairy. Luckily we had enough quarters laying around for FIVE teeth. She gets six quarters per tooth. I am sure that is REALLY cheap as far as tooth fairies are concerned...but she doesn't mind.

AND NOW??? We LOVE THE TOOTHLESS GRIN!!

I decided to do it = a SFG garden!

I admit, I haven’t done a REAL blog post in awhile. So I made myself sit down and post…with PICTURES even. So, here is one of the MANY and seemingly never ending project we have undertaken. Before Tami moved she came over and helped me build my first Square Foot Garden.

I have been literally SO excited to do a square foot garden ever since I read “The All New Square foot Gardening Book” which our garden group in the ward I moved away from were discussing. After reading the book I was so convinced that it was the WAY to go – no tilling, no weeding, big yield in small spaces, growing vertically, no bugs, rotation all built into it…SO I gave it a GO.

I felt like an Amazon women as I drilled into the 2 X 6 wood frames with deck screws (doesn’t take much does it?!) I put the frames on top of my grass, nailed on the weed cloth, and filled it with compost, vermiculite, perlite and peat moss. And then I spray painted electrical conduit and put that over rebar to create the vertical frames. Here it is:

My first grids I did were made of aluminum blinds and fell apart right away. So I bit the bullet and made wooden grids - I am really glad I did! Much more sturdy.

I will say, compared to previous gardening I have done I have been bored because there is literally almost nothing to do after the initial assembling and planting. Just some major pruning to the tomatoes to make them grow up the netting, and some tying of the zucchini plants to stakes to make them grow up netting.

I also made a garbage can compost bin to which I drilled about 120 holes. I put newspaper and kitchen scraps and roll the garbage can once a day (I am sure my neighbors think I am crazy) and whallah! I have compost in 5 weeks. Do I sound like a total gardening nerd?

Has anyone else tried this? Have you heard about it? What are your experiences with it?

LLAAA!!! (sung with vibrato) NEW MOON TRAILER!!

Hello people - I am REALLY living up my adolesence here, but here is the trailer link on Stephenie Meyer's website to the New Moon Trailer.

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=58185785

It looks REALLY good.

Check out the eyes this time on the vampires - much more enhanced don't you think?

Rosalie looks MUCH better too.

What are your thoughts?!?!?!?

Kylie is 1! How did that happen?

The first month she was born seemed like it was pleasantly long. Now, all of a sudden she is ONE!!

I am a little wistful, but of course happy she is thriving. In Korea, they don't even have a baby shower til the baby is one because the mortality rate is so high. So the first birthday is a HUGE deal. As it should be.

Some cutities (yes I made that word up) about Kylie:

*She giggles and giggles with Tyler and Brooke, especially when its time to go to sleep at night.

*She can sign - and does so VERY proficiently - the words "all done" "milk" "yes" "bye, hi" "so big" "i love you"

*She can say "all done" "bye" "tyler" "button" "airplane" "grandma" "grandpa" "chicken(that was a new one today)" "car" "ball" "mama" "dada" "boouh(Brooke)" "no"

*She is an intensly fast crawler and a proficient stander, and does not see any reason to make any steps, since she can crawl at 10 mph.

*She sleeps 12 hours in a row at night - bless her soul!

*Kylie is only a bully to one person - her 10 1/2 mo. cousin Kaiya, who she insists on taking all of her possessions (toys, pacifier, etc).

*Kylie has a VERY TOOTHY grin. Probably more teeth at this age than my other kids had.

*She is ticklish in every muscle on her body, including her little buns, her back, her facial cheeks, right below her shoulders, her arms, her jaw, her feet, her legs - all over, her tummy.

*She does NOT care for sweet things, not even fruit that much. She LOVES veggies. One time Grandma Wayne gave her cake. She took a bite and looked very dissapointed. Then she reached for her carrot stick. She LOVE tomatoes, beans, lettuce (I know - I am surprised at that one), cucumbers, zucchini - literally EVERY vegetable. Meats she like just ok. Bananas - she prefers the peel to the fruit. Orange - she also prefers the peel to the fruit (which Ironically DO have the most Vit. C)

*Her favorite toy right now is a pirate ship.

*She loves to eat rocks out of our large living room plant pot.

*She reminds me of a faithful puppy, always innocently and obediently following me around without question and without whining, just faithfully and cheerfully. ..unless I change rooms more than 10 times in 1 minute, then she gets irritated.

We LOVE LOVE LOVE our little girl and feel SOOO lucky to have her in our family!

Brookes first day at her NEW school

Brooke was so excited to go to "Mrs. G's" class.

The wrong bus ended up picking her up ONE hour early, so she sat in the office and COLORED for 45 minutes. To her it was all part of the plan. She loved every minute of it and whipped through 18 pictures - most of them horses, of course.

The office called me to let me know of the error and commented to me that she is the most happy and cheerful girl they have ever met.

She LOVED her teacher, which is not surprising. She usually idolizes all her teachers and thinks they are the most brilliant and interesting and beautiful people on the earth.

Brian asked her tonite who her best friends so far are in her class.

She gave a very candid and (for me) kind of a heart wrenching reply:

"I don't have any of those... I will have to make some tomorrow."

TRICKS on getting GOOD DEALS...

So, since we had absolutely NO appliances in our house we had to REALLY be smart about getting our appliances. And, last minute, the free washer and dryer we had lined up FELL THROUGH.

So after LOTS of work I learned a few tricks along the way.

The house actually DID come with a black oven range, but Brian and I both really wanted Stainless Steel appliances. I didn't know if that would work out because I was only budgeting $900 on a fridge, $200 on an over the range microwave, and $100 (after selling the black one on craigs list) on a oven range.

SO pretty tight. I also did TONS of research about IF Stainless Steel WAS the way to go - I read complaint after complaint that FINGERPRINTS are a big problem.

Well, after taking several trips to HOME DEPOT I found a SS steel fridge, oven and microwave that were all pretty good deals and were CLEAN STEEL by GE - which apparently totally cuts down on the fingerprint thing.

METHOD

*I wrote down the model numbers of all three things.

*I did reviews online - retrevo.com - to see how they rated. They rate them by model #.

*I also typed the model # into google to see who was listing it and for how much

*In my case BEST BUY had the fridge and stove on sale for $150 off. I printed out the sale.

*I brought in the Best Buy sale printouts to HOME DEPOT. They MATCH and take off and additional 10%, which brought BOTH my fridge and oven to exactly my budget.

*I had BEST BUY POINTS which I redeemed into $110 in gift certificates for the microwave. I found it on bestbuy.com and printed it out. They don't carry it in the store, but because I had the model number and the sale print out, they ordered it in the store for me - NO ADDITIONAL charge. AND I only ended up paying $98 because of my gift card points.

TOTALLY ON BUDGET. SAVINGS: $550

BUT, we found out today NO washer and dryer.

*I went on Craigs List this morning and replied to about 10 different W & D postings. I called and left messages.

*I scrolled to the bottom and looked at the bottom ones first. Those people are probably more in a hurry to sell because they listing has been there for a week already.

*I offered either $50 or $100 below what they posted for.

*I heard answers back within 30 minutes, asked the appropriate questions, and we got a 2 year old washer and dryer for $375.

ANY amount on the washer and dryer was OVER BUDGET because we were told we could have these ones for free, but not BAD compared to paying over $900 for new.
SAVINGS: $600

We have our black oven on craigs list now.

*I typed in the model number and found out what everyone was selling the model for (BRAND NEW) and posted it for $30 less. That will pay for the new oven.

And THATS the RECESSION way to buy appliances!!

WE DID IT - PHEW!!!

So - short post, but WE CLOSED (after another 4 excructiating hours in the title office with one problem surfacing after another!)

BUT - WE ARE IN! We started painting. Brian's dad is a MASTER PAINTER and he would cut the walls in, while I would cover the walls. We BUSTED IT OUT!!

We got everything painted except the bathrooms.

AND, today everything was moved in. Boxes everywhere. Chaos everywhere. Dust everywhere. Strangers everywhere.

BUT ALSO the exciting unknown - everywhere, possibilities everywhere, new people everywhere, EVEN a different culture (its STILL Chicago - but different parts of Chicago are different culturally)

We won't actually SLEEP in the house until Tuesday night - too FUMEY, too DUSTY...AND I could not get Brooke signed up for school yet, so she has 3 more Days at her old school.

Still I am in Denial, and I get sad if I THINK too much (about what I am leaving behind).

FRENZIED DAY - THE HOUSE CLOSING SAGA CONTINUES....

The KHH (builder) rep was MAD, My attorney was CALM but MAD, my realtor was CALM AND COLLECTED, my lender was AT HER WITS END.

So, the only way to get around WELLS FARGO's mistake on DROPPING the BALL for our house closing, was to suggest a CRAZY SOLUTION....or our closing would be in TWO WEEKS!!

So, what WAS the solution? Find someone that had 33K lying around for the past 30 days in an account and have them "give us" that amount, to which we would return to them immediately with our "rejected" down payment. IS THAT NOT INSANE?

OTHERWISE we go to a "FULL DOCUMENTATION" loan which takes TWO WEEKS.

So I made 97 calls today. I thought at first we would be closing FRIDAY. Then I thought we would be moving in 1 WEEK at one point today, then I thought we were closing TOMORROW. So to change dates with all involved....

I called each of the utility companies THREE TIMES today (15 calls) to change start dates every time I called (I think they know me by voice now),
I talked with my lender girl 24 times today,
the ATTORNEY 3 times,
I talked to Uhaul THREE TIMES to change dates,
I called BROOKE'S SCHOOL to change last day,
I called my PARENTS 3 times,
my REALTOR 5 times,
the GARAGE DOOR guy 2 times,
the APPLIANCE people,
My sister 3 times, the new WARD people....

My mother in law is BRILLIANT. She suggested that they take out a "home equity loan" of 33K for 3 days essentially, that we would repay with the TRUE downpayment money. The bank accepted. So THEY were at the bank for 1 hour - BLESS THEIR SOULS!!!!

Kimball Hill our builder, was LIVID with Wells Fargo. The manager for KH was called WELLS FARGO VICE PRES and many HIGH UP people and I can just IMAGINE what words were exchanged. Wells Fargo has screwed them over TOO many times. We are the LAST CLOSING for them EVER (they went bankrupt 6 months ago) - and for OUR closing to be delayed is VERY COSTLY to Kimball Hill.

Also - I must have faxed about 60 documents today to our lender - in about 5 trips as they kept asking for MORE STUFF.

So - CROSS YOUR FINGERS - lets hope they don't want me to fax over DENTAL RECORDS, GENEOLOGY BACK TO ADAM, REPORT CARDS from Kindergarten, Immunization records, or Passport information?!?!??!?!??!

NIGHTMARE HOUSE CLOSING - WHAT THE HECK?!?!?

So, today WAS the big exciting day to close on our house. I was so nervous (I know that seems like a weird emotion per se..) that I could barely eat. I was a ball of energy.

So we get there at 3 PM, and get the word that our Lender - I might add a MAJOR BANK - did not wire the money on time and it was past the magical time of 3:30 and nothing more could be wired.

Well, a hassle, but no big deal. We just wouldn't be able to get in tonite. We would have to fax some stuff, meet someone tomorrow, and get the keys after the wired money was taken care of. So we did what we could - sign ALL the papers.

It took 2 hours.

I called our lender girl as I drove away if she knew what happened. She had told me everything was ALL GOOD TO GO, and yet here we were, our downpayment in hand, and the bank did not WIRE THE MONEY. I asked in my message if she could help speed things along for the next day.

So I get a voice message as I was picking up my kids from the babysitters - THERE IS A BIG PROBLEM.

Because we did NET anything on the house we sold in November, THERE IS A BIG PROBLEM. The COMPUTER shows that we are 13 K short because we didn't net that on the house, EVEN THOUGH we had the entire down payment in hand.

We are no longer a "straight to close" loan - we are now a "need tons of documentation" close. So we find this out, a 7 PM TONITE, instead of BEFORE or AT THE TABLE at closing. Or better yet - DURING THE 7 MONTHS WE HAVE BEEN WORKING WITH OUR LENDER, or THE 5 1/2 months ago that we actually SOLD our house!

That this was even a TERM in the contract was never conveyed to us. No one VERIFIED that we actually did or did NOT net that. And to ambiguously think that we DID net that amount is a little preposterous. We were told that EVERYTHING WAS GOOD TO GO - BUT NO.

I asked her what the bottom line was - she said she didn't guarentee we would close tomorrow.

*This may not SEEM like a big deal, but when we have
*MOVING TRUCKS,
*HELPERS IN TWO CITIES TO MOVE ON SAT.,
* APPLIANCES BEING DELIVERED on Thursday,
*A GARAGE DOOR PERSON COMING in 2 days,
*People coming to help PAINT tomorrow,
*People coming to INSTALL appliances on Thursday,
*Brian getting SUB PLANS for the next THREE days all ready,
*SITTERS for the next FIVE days (not easy to get all those ducks in a row - let me tell you!), *UTILITIES being turned on tomorrow

... I mean we really planned ahead to make everything work.

So I am TOTALLY emotionally exhausted and drained of ALL energy.

I just keep telling myself - it will work out!!!

Moving Day approaches....

Am I ready? We won't have a fridge, oven, microwave, washer OR dryer in our new place. All the walls are STARK white (can we say revisiting student housing wall whiteness nightmares) and the lawn is currently all dirt. The clothes closets all need shelving units in them. There is not even a pegboard in the garage to hand up a rake.

Am I ready to take this on? Do I have the energy? Do I have the stamina? Do I have the ability to remind myself that Rome wasn't built in a day? Do I have the patience to deal with my kids surrounded, ONCE AGAIN, by totally and utter chaos????

Do I have the heart to throw out our couches that got invaded by mice? The couches that I love?

Will we have money to put in air conditioning for the summer?

Will we have money, someday, to buy ourselves a place to sit our behinds in our living room?

Should we invest in some camping chairs for our living room?

How am I going to organize the kitchen? Do I really lack an intuition for kitchen organizing?

Can I bear to look in box after box and see the never-ending randomness that is inside them?

CAN I DO IT????? I must take a deep breathe, and just TRY to convince myself I can do it!!

BABY SIGN LANGUAGE

So, I have to say, BABY SIGN LANGUAGE is very exciting. Its actually ASL (American Sign Language) using the most important words for babies.

I have done it with all 3 of my kids, and it is a LIFESAVER.

So far Kylianne has signed the soonest. She started signing "All Done" at 10 1/2 months.

This has been the BEST tool, because she can tell me if she is grunting because she wants "MORE" (she still hasn't done this one yet) or if she is "ALL DONE" from eating.

And last night, to my exploding heart's delight, she put her hand up to my I-love-you-signed hand and signed back "I Love you" (not perfect form of course) back at me as she said,

"Luh-buh!"

For being just shy of 11 months, is close enough for ME to understand what she means.

Brooke's first sign came at 13 months and is was "MORE" and shortly thereafter it was "PLEASE."

Tyler signed "PLEASE" about that same age.

Kylie's other developments, for anyone that cares, is she has 8 TEETH NOW! I think that is the biggest mouthful of teeth at that age of all my kids.

AND she does not take after her mom, who was bald until she was 2, she has got some great CRAZY BABY EINSTEIN hair that is only tamed in pig-tails.

Has anyone else had good exeriences with Baby Signing? Which signs did your kids do first? Do you continue to use signing with your kids in church or anything?

HILARIOUS TWILIGHT ONE MINUTE SPOOF - ESPECIALLY THE PART WITH ALICE PITCHING!!

I LAUGHED SO HARD AT THIS. Brian and I both love it when "Alice" says

"ITS TIME!" And then pitches the baseball - so horribly - and so hilariously!!!!!

I am just going to put the link because this video part is giving me a hard time -but it is so worth the FOUR MINUTES. You will be laughing to yourself all day!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=goix7jFXD9Q

NEW MOON MADNESS?????

SO, maybe I am regressing back to my teenage years, but I have become an somewhat AVID follower of TWILGHT'S sequel movie - NEW MOON- and their website.

http://www.newmoonmovie.org/

I like checking out what they filmed that day, casting developments, and so forth.

Here are the new movie posters - FUN!!

Me and THE GIRLS here have a plan in place already for November to see NEW MOON at the local

IMAX THEATER.

OH YEAH!!!

Which poster do you NEW MOON fans like better?

FINAL WALK THROUGH

Well, it was very surreal, but we had our final walk-through of our cute house. Its ALL done - totally. The only things left to do are pour the driveway, and sod the house - which are the builder's job.

The weird part? We still don't move in for another...um...5 weeks. We take possession of the house on April 28th.

So, its all still surreal.

Meanwhile, we are still enjoying living with Brian's parents.

Its fun in lots of ways - always someone to converse ADULT conversations with. It usually tends to be about politics - and its lots of fun.

There is always someone to watch the kids if I have to run a quick errand.

There's always someone to watch a movie with if Brian has to work.

There is always someone to play a game with. Last night we played Scrabble with Brian's parents until 9:30.

I only cook the meals THREE nights a week. Brian's mom cooks FOUR nights a week - and she is a FABULOUS cook.

We always eat on time.

There is someone to back me up on discipline issues when Brian isn't home (which is MOST of the time - the boy is gone A LOT!)

There is always a "PAL" for the kids - Grandma and Grandpa - to give them extra hugs, or take them out to fly a kite or for a ride on the bike.

The cleaning chores are divided - its amazing how much less it feels like there is to do when I am not the ONLY one cleaning.

So, yes we are excited to move on and be on our own, BUT we sure do like the perks of living with Brian's parents and we will miss it. Do I sound crazy? We really LOVE living here!

UPDATE ON TYLER'S ASTHMA; NAET?

So, its been awhile since I have posted on Tyler's asthma and his treatments we have been undergoing with NAET - and allergy elimination technique.

So, NOW EIGHT months later, Tyler is still off ALL SEVEN MEDICATIONS. It is GLORIOUS.

EXCEPT when we would go visit my parents house, wherein lives 2 cats. Well, we actually had to take fur samples from both cats, as well as saliva samples, and treat Tyler for them.

Also, Tyler was allergic to the dust at my parents house and other dust in general, so we had to accumulate samples of each of the rooms there.

He has "passed" the treatments and is doing very well.

He only has 5 of like 20 things, to go. He is now NO LONGER ALLERGIC to the following:

Eggs, Wheat, Corn, Shellfish, Vinegar, Cats, Dust, Pollen, Sugars, Food Additaves and Preseveratives, Feathers and a few others.

He still has to be treated for Mold, Trees, phenyls in plastics, Nitrates/nitrites and Radiation (I know - crazy)

But he showed before he got treated for each individual allergen that his histamine levels for all of the above were affected, as well as (SURPRISE) his lungs reacted to EVERYTHING.

I ran into another cute mom at the clinic today, and she told me that her 2 year old little boy has asthma and through NAET (allergy elimiation technique - http://www.naet.com/) was off of ALL of his meds as well.

It has made the HUGEST difference in our lives - and also in the health AND demeanor of our cute Tyler.

EVER PLAYED QUELF????

So, My new FAVORITE FAVORITE Game is called "Quelf." Have you ever played it? It is SO hilarious. I mean REALLY REALLY zany.

This is my brother in law Kevin. In this picture, during the game QUELF, he had to go run and construct SNORKELING gear with whatever materials he could find. But he couldn't tell anyone what he was doing. So all we see is him running, rustling in the kitchen, and he comes back with snorkeling gear made of SARAN WRAP and a SPOON.

He had to wear it for the rest of the game.

Also around his neck you will see TOILET PAPER. He had to, without telling us, go and put a pick of toilet paper around his neck, and also wear THAT the whole game.

That is just part of it. I picked a card that told me I could only communicate in GRUNTS and MOANS - it was called "the FRANKENSTEIN RULE."

If you cannot fulfil your requirements or you mess up, then you have to go back a set number of spaces on the board.

When somebody laughed, my father in law had to say to each person, "I COMMAND YOU TO BE SILENT!!" Which of course made us laugh MORE!

My brother in law Chris, had to find an object to be his MASCOT and give it a cute name, and keep by him the entire game. He chose a BOTTLE OF GLUE and named it "RENDY."

I mean, it is SOOOOO random, but sooo hilarious. You end up just LAUGHING HISTERICALLY THE ENTIRE GAME!!!

New Interior Pics from our house being built - almost done!!

Tyler is covered in construction dust as he pours out his love to his imprisoned Kylianne.

Kylie is bored - no question. But she does want you to keep on scrolling down and check out the pics.

Brian standing in the Master Bedroom - with the laundry room behind him. He rescues Kylie from her little carseat prison.

Our Master Bedroom Bathroom. We cannot believe we will ACTUALLY have drawers and cupboards, and TWO sinks. There is a separate toilet room, which we are tickled about. No more getting trapped in the bathtub while somebody's nature is calling them. I know TMI - but REALLY - this will be SO MUCH MORE apropoe to a relaxing bath.

This is from the entryway looking at the living room and part of the bar area.

So....there is no door to the Master Bathroom. Is that weird? Should we add a door or curtain or anything? I love the pillar things. The closet is at the end of the bathroom area. That could be interesting.

We sense that our kids are excited....except for Kylie, who is going with the flow.

How LONG has it been since we have lived not in our own house? 4 months and 5 days.

This is the kids bathroom - formerly the same size as our ONLY household bathroom.

Homebuilders too can mess up apparently. Here is the botched kitchen countertop sitting on the living room floor. They cut it WRONG - whoops!

This is the island ish station with bar on the other side looking over the living room.

This is from the living room looking into the kitchen area.

Our cute painter was there one Saturday when we came to check things out. Tyler was mesmerized. We love the lighting fixture in here - but we are using this as a music room and not a dining room. Any suggestions? Keep the cute light?

Brooke and Tyler checking out the kitchen just put in. The botched countertop is sitting on the cabinets. Look closely - can you see what is wrong???

Looking from the eat in kitchen area at the living room/entryway. This is the propane heater phase - before the furnace was hooked up.

You may have noticed everything is VERY WHITE. If you can remember, PRETTY PLEASE tell me what your FAVORITE paint color is - name and brand - and what hue it is. I am totally open to suggestions!!!!!!!!!!!

So there is the VIP tour!!!!

Little Boys ARE DIRTY!!

My adorable, cute, sweet loving 3 1/2 year old is more CURIOUS than a CAT, and DIRTIER than a ......well, you get the picture.

As my little sweetheart wakes up "stinky" he stealthily gets himself dressed and changed and comes downstairs. Perplexed by his efficiency, I go upstairs to find not just the stinky diaper on the floor, but ALSO poo on the floor. I THEN find the scarves and gloves that we currently keep in his closet each have some poo on them. HE HAS BEEN WIPING HIS BUM WITH OUR WINTER GEAR!!!

GAG ME!!

As I go about my day, I find two cars in his little potty - sitting in urine. Seriously, what is it with him and his excrements?

I go upstairs before getting Brooke off the bus to make sure he is in his bed for his nap. I find a willowly, flowly, snakelike SEA OF TOILET PAPER cascading down the hallway and in big fluffy PILES in the bathroom. I have precisely 4 minutes until I have to meet Brooke on the corner. I am rerolling the toilet paper at blister-producing speed to get it wound back on the roll, adreneline pumping and sweat beading up on my furrowed brow.

Tyler gets a nice firm SPANK. Yes, I DO occasionally spank my children - and THIS is one of those times.

When he is safely in his nap I go check on the downstairs bathroom and find a big pile of CEREAL on the bathroom floor right by Tyler's little potty. HUH? I then notice a little cereal trail through the bathroom, on through the dining room, and into the pantry when cereal is found strewn about in little piles resting on each shelf until I find the UPTURNED cereal box.

Its like I am on some sort of sadistical Easter Egg Hunt just waiting to see what other horrible presents Tyler has left me.

I go up to my room to relax for a minute and go on the computer. But I cannot rest because all my good SCRAPBOOKING MARKERS AND SCISSORS are all strewn about, the CAPS are all off (SOUND THE MONEY ALARM, there is NO way I am buying new ones!) as well as some UNMENTIONABLES taken out of drawers. AHHH!

Then I go to put the mail on the desk and step on something sharp. I step backwards - OUCH!! THUMBTACKS EVERYWHERE on the ground. Then I see good ART chalk on the ground, then Markers, then GLUESTICKS....and a dislodged DRAWER of the desk upturned.

STEAM BILLOWS A HIGH SPEEDS OUT MY EARS.

I go to retrieve some of the rechargeable batteries that we use for our wireless keyboard and, OF COURSE, they are ALL MISSING. CRAP!! But my 2nd child, Tyler, WHOM I LOVE, is sleeping LIKE AN ANGEL. How is this possible, when he has been so good at creating CHAOS?

I think to myself on days like these - I just can't deal with any more poo, or accidents, or spilled food, or missing batteries, and I KNOW, I just KNOW, that I will LAUGH about this tomorrow!!!

Obama is RUINING the Economy - WSJ

So, each day to me is PROOF how horrible Obama is for the country with his leftist policies and financial INSANITY!

Our debt currently - not even INCLUDING the other stimulus plan coming AND the Universal Health Care thing he wants to do (another 1.2 trillion) EXCEEDS the WORLD'S GDP!!

Um, Yikes.

According to Wall Street Journal, Obama's Radicalism is a festering culprit:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123629969453946717.html

And yet, here in Chicago - Obama's media playground - we have TV broadcaster and newspaper journalists, and radio talk heads saying, "Wall Street just doesn't seem to be responding to Obama's policies."

UM - try that he is single handedly DESTROYING it. Anytime anyone from Washington speaks, the Stock Market plummets.

HAD TO VENT SOMEWHERE!!!!!

THE BACHELOR - FOR ONCE DARN GOOD TV

So, I have not watched "The Bachelor" since my Wyview Days at BYU. But somehow last night's Finale attracted my attention. Maybe its because the guy had this really cute little boy. Maybe its because the girls didn't seem like total ditzes. Maybe I needed a good Romantic Fix. Whatever it was, I was compelled to watch ALL THREE HOURS, to Brian's Dismay.

So I was TOTALLY FLABBERGASTED that after the cutest rose ceremony, where I convinced and rooting for Melissa and very satisfied with the result, I was equally stunned to see the taped Break up. I don't think the guy is a flake. I can respect the fact that the real world brought them to see sides of each other that were not infused in the circumstances of the taping of the show. I have to respect the guy for not just letting it slowly drift, or leading her on, or whatever.

BUT - totally brutal to do this in front of everyone, allthought it made for some DARN GOOD TV, I have to say. It doesn't get too much better than that.

Equally as interesting to me was the previously rejected girl, brought back on to infuse their previously nixed relationship with life, Molly's reaction. I had to laugh when this guy was pouring his heart out to her. She kept looking to Chris Harrison, the host, to see if this was some kind of joke, or to get some guidance. She didn't believe it, and was so totally stunned. It was so funny to me HOW speechless this girl was. She had this look of shock on her face and just kind of giggled nervously when asked a question, without actually saying anything. It was FABULOUS!!!

I am going to book club tonite to discuss "PAVILLION OF WOMEN" by Pearl Buck. But I know I will be DYING to know what happens on Part 2. DARN OUR LACK OF DVR OR TIVO!!!