Busy Monday, April 25

Today's 'To-Do' List

• Write this Blog
• Make a Menu
• Go to work (I was out sick Friday and it was the end of a payroll week so I have to go in and get my papers sorted and they'll probably grab me for something else too while I'm there)
• Go grocery Shopping
• Lunch with Peter 
• Catch up on chores around the house
• Get more plants put in the ground
• Homemakers Club 5:30-6:30
• Music Class 7pm

Menu

• Hamburger Helper (left from last week)
• Cheesy Chicken
• Spaghetti
• Tacos
• Pizza
• Barbecue
• Chicken Nuggets & French Fries

This Week's 'To-Do' List

• All week - Work/School for the Family
• Tuesday- Fine Arts Festival for Band
• Thursday - Brielle has an Orchestra Festival Assessment 
• Thursday - Music Class 
• Saturday - Morning: Botanical Garden Plant Sale 8-12, Farmers Market 6:30-12
• Saturday - Evening: Thank you Barbecue to all our house sitters 

Last Week

The Orchestra Fine arts went alright though I felt my class was off like we lost confidence in a part and bowings were getting messed up we just didn't have time to practice as a full group like we needed. Brielle's High School group did so wonderfully. I haven't uploaded pictures or videos of that yet.

Steam club was awesome. The lady that came actually has a show called Bandit Patrol and she came out with a collection of birds and with a red shouldered hawk that had been rehabilitated and we released back to the wild.
I actually took some video too that I'll see about getting up on youtube. It was extremely informative and really awesome!

I didn't take any pictures Thursday at the Arts Festival for Chorus but of course I had lots of video I've taken. Katherine is so easy to pick out from the rest of the kids even in Middle School she's her own person and she was swaying and near dancing through the whole time they were singing. She really gets into it.

Friday was a mess. I was out in the rain 3 times Thursday because my umbrella got removed from my car so I was feeling sick and then there was a tragedy in the family that I'm still trying to process but I'm doing better... if keeping myself busy is being better. Then you throw on top of that I lost my wallet and had to drive Brielle to school without ID on me and then I came home and I looked and I looked and Peter came home for lunch that day and helped me look. We eventually did find it thankfully. It really all just was so much stress my whole body just broke down and I was coughing and laid up in bed pretty much all day. It looked like a gorgeous day out so I  really would have rather been at work.

My husband went off to play cards that evening so I tried to keep myself busy because my mind wandering was not a good thing as I was trying to understand what had happened in my family. I didn't feel well enough to do something like clean so instead I crafted aka something I could sit down for most of the time. I put Katherine's name up a little high but I found that burlap on discount and I bought a canvas with a coupon the week before and then Friday night I printed out some letters and cut them out by hand then stenciled it on. After Katherine and I found what color she liked. I put her name too high so we're going to figure something out for the bottom of this project so it looks less awkward.

That evening since I was feeling better and still trying to process the tragedy I went out for coffee with a friend where I proceeded to lose my wallet again and I could have sworn I had it with me at home so I was up until 2 am searching. In the morning I made a phone call to the coffee shop and they had it there so I was up and out the door by 8:30 that morning picked up my friend so we could go get my wallet and then we drove out to her friends house to get strawberries because her friend was trying to clean up her strawberry patch so she could walk the rows.

Peter was going to go out again that evening but I was still reeling from Friday so I asked him to stay home. We had some friends come over and we played some videogames together. (This is all TMI isn't it).

Sunday, I took apart some pallets (my husband helped me at the end I was just so exhausted), we did some shopping and my husband worked on a mask for the convention in June. I worked on building my planting bench though I did make it a bit tall I'm going to have to cut the legs down. I didn't get done but  I got the frame done and then a little bit later that evening I got part of the tabletop done also. The boys complimented me on my work which made me feel good.

I also asked the girls to please clean out the garden boxes (well all but the one that has been taken over by parsley). I told them if they finished that up I'd take them out for icecream. They did a wonderful job without complaints or constantly going indoors so we all went out for ice cream last night.

We also had a friend of ours over last night who brought over his welder and fixed up our barbecue cover that last fall had been picked up by the wind and thrown into the kids swingset.

Things are coming together slowly but surely but there's still a lot more to do in my own home life and just a lot to be done on the emotional range of things too.

Sorry I'm being a bit wordy. I really do need to get ready for work.

Busy Monday, April 18

Today's 'To-Do' List

• Write this Blog
• Make a menu
• Go grocery Shopping
• Lunch with Peter 
• Catch up on chores around the house
• Do some work outside/get plants in the ground
• Music Class & Taking Brielle with me tonight
• Recheck Out/Return Library Books

Menu

• Grilled Cheese & Tomato Soup (didn't make last week)
• Crockpot Pulled Pork
• Crockpot Chicken Tacos
• Crockpot Royal Round
• Hamburger Helper
• Pizza
• Grilled Pork, Baked Potatoes & Beans

This Week's 'To-Do' List

• All week - Work/School for the Family
• Tuesday- Fine Arts Festival for Strings. Brielle has a performance with the High School and I have a performance with the other Adult students with some of the High School & Middle School filling in since we are such a small class. 
• Wednesday - Last 4-H STEM Club until the Fall
• Thursday - I have music class but it will depend if I go according to what is going on with Katherine. Katherine may have a performance for Chorus at the Fine Arts Festival that evening. 
• Friday- I need to take Brielle to the Middle School in the morning and pick her up in the afternoon from there also because they are having a special session with Ryan Joseph.  
• Saturday - RPG game in the evening it was canceled this past week due to schedule 
• Sunday.... I'm Free I think OMG I'm free I'm free *knock on wood* 

Last Week

I can't even remember last week. I remember what I did at work but my wheels were spinning through that week so it's all pretty much a blur. The 4-H Banquet went well I do remember that. Katherine's Chorus Competition sounded like it went well and I went to a new store and found the shirt she needed right away so that was a true score. Hmm what else.... Don't quite remember but on Friday the girls had the Art Show and they did pretty well during that other than Katherine wanted to get up from her booth too much but she was the youngest person there they let her do it at age 11 instead of 13 since she was already in 6th grade and was already involved with many of the Library's teen activities.

I think that sums it up. Oh we moved Stitch N Bitch to Saturday due to a confliction one of the ladies is having on Sunday's now and I stocked up on WAY too much fabric that they had on sale at Jo-Ann's (RIP  Hancock) and I even got some material to start a new craft. I've been kind of stuck as I'm waiting to find out the gender of a couple babies. Two of our ladies in the group are pregnant! So I'm going to be behind the sewing machine a lot coming up here soon.

I think that is it in a nutshell.
Hope everyone has a great week and I will start posting on projects as soon as I get a spare second to get started on some. Feels like I've been non-stop running lately. Oh and BTW I'm loving the gorgeous weather but it's suppose to be up to 83 today... I could use a break from the heat! Mid-70's would have been great for it to stop at for awhile.

Busy Monday, April 11

Today's 'To-Do' List

• Write this Blog
• Make a menu
• Go grocery Shopping
• Lunch with Peter 
• Catch up on chores around the house
• Music Class

Menu

• Hot Dogs w/chips (and leftover potatoes & corn from last night)
• Grilled Chicken, Pasta & Peas
• OnCor Chicken Parm with Spaghetti
• Thursday - 4-H Banquet
• Grilled Cheese & Tomato Soup
• Pizza
• OnCor Boneless Rib sandwiches and French Fries

This Week's 'To-Do' List

• All week - Work/School for the Family
• Wednesday - Brie Orthodontist (we're on the last legs of this they keep doing their final adjustments if she would just remember to keep her bands in. Hoping we get the GO for scheduling them taking them off this time but we'll see.)
• Thursday - Kat has Chorus but the teacher won't tell me what time. Brie has an doc appt at 4pm. 6pm is the 4-H Banquet! Busy busy day! (Oh goodness I'm suppose to have class that day too and I think it overlaps with something else! I'm going to have to find out.)
• Friday - Library Teen Art Gallery both kids have elected to participate. 
• Saturday - RPG game in the evening. Unsure if I'm going to have Stitch N Bitch that morning or not. It's normally Sundays but one of the ladies husbands decided that he was going to take every Sunday for himself and she has a 2 year old so we're trying to figure out how to shuffle things. If I don't have SnB that morning then it is the first day of the Saturday Farmers market so I'm tempted to go out there. 

Last Week

Last week was Spring Break and we went down to Florida transferring some of my parents timeshare points. First let me get this off my chest. We stayed at Westgate Spa and Resort on Turkey Lake Rd and I highly suggest you NEVER EVER stay with them. They were horrific! Even though we used timeshare points to go there and paid for our stay and got nothing free out of it we were pushed into a high pressure sales situation that by the end of it they had destroyed my nevers where I was shaking and and couldn't even speak steady because I was on the verge of tears! They were telling us we were horrible parents and all sorts of stuff because we didn't want to buy into their timeshare! It was BAD! After we lost half a day we weren't expecting to lose (That was Monday) we tried to make the best of that day and of our vacation. The room was about in the condition of a Motel 6. There weren't enough plug-ins. The wifi access was limited and extremely, painfully slow. Everything there cost a horrific amount. There is no tour of facilities. There is no information even on what to do with your trash or linens. I have never had such a horrific experience and I've stayed some questionable places before.

That aside we did spend a week down in Orlando, Florida. We spent 3 days at Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure. We went to Cocoa Beach. We went to Medieval Times. We even went out and played Putt-putt (they had it there at the resort but we refused to do anything there after what they did to us).

Other than our 'resort' we had a fabulous time. I took nearly 500 pictures on my camera not counting my phone so I'll try to pick and choose from among them. :) Universal was all so hugely done. I mean the buildings so decoratively made and so much detail into every little bit and it just towered above you. It was actually really impressive.

This was what the decor was like at the Putt-Putt place! Seriously this and a large pirate ship and other pirate stuff! It was beautiful! I cannot say enough about Pirates Cove in Orlando! It was a fun course and just gorgeous! 

The losers at the Putt-Putt place! 

The girls named Medieval Times the BEST part of the vacation. 

It was hard to get pictures. Ours was the Black and White Knight!

And then last but not least is a picture of the beach. Our whiteness would blind people so I'm not going to post any pictures of us out on it. The water was very cold but the girls got out into it and enjoyed themselves. Peter and I ended up taking a short walk along the beach and we both decided that future vacations we will go back to the beach as per normal. We are no longer taking our July vacations... It's a long and private story but know it is for the best for all of us so it will be just us working out a good time in the future to start doing our ocean side adventures again. 

All in all we enjoyed ourselves. Though the drive down and the drive back up weren't very pleasant. My facebook is filled with bad words about the traffic in Atlanta. What should have been a 12 hour drive was closer to a 14-15 hour drive to put it one way. 

I need to sit down and figure out how much this vacation truly cost us. We had been saving for the past year but I know we went over just our savings. A trip like this is pretty expensive so it's kind of a once in a lifetime (or twice for Peter since he went as a kid) sort of thing at least for us it is. 

-----------------------------------------------------

Oh while it is on my mind. Review of the Pork Loin with Garlic Rub I tried from the Don't Panic More Dinner's in the Freezer book. It was alright not stellar. It called for way too much salt though. I even decreased it a tad bit when making it and it just called for way too much sodium. I may go ahead and write down the recipe but I'm going to have to make some adjustments.