It all comes out in the wash

Well, sometimes it doesn't but he just has to keep scrubbing until it does.

I always complain about the laundry, the 3 loads a day, the stains, the clean clothes that I am rewashing, the markers Sarah leaves in her pockets, etc. but I'm so glad that my husband is now doing his own laundry. His uniforms are so dirty at the end of the week that I would just throw them out and send him to buy new ones. He doesn't though, he washes and scrubs until they look like this -

Trees

After the hurricanes Katrina and Ike a lot of the trees that were still standing along the coastline were either damaged or dead. The is an artist that is going around the coast of Mississippi carving the trees into sculptures. I wish I could have brought one home because they are amazing.






The big owl in this picture was about the length of my van.


Some of the trees had roots that were so strong they couldn't be ripped from the ground. They were strong enough to withstand the winds but didn't stand unchanged from them. The swirling winds from the hurricanes twisted the trunks of these massive trees.They will forever be a reminder of what happened there.

Project of the day

My kitchen table is a hand-me-down from my great grandmother. The table is in great condition but the chairs are falling apart. Actually the chairs were also in good condition until they came to live at my house. When we got down to two chairs I figured it was time to do something about it. I started hunting for replacement chairs that would look good with my table but the only ones I could find were almost $80 each and I would have to assemble and stain them myself so that was out. I don't have enough confidence in myself to try building chairs from scratch and the pieces to build a chair would cost about $75 so I decided a bench would do fine.

Now I just have to stain it to match the table but I think I'm gonna save that for next week.

Yesterdays Project

Last week I was driving through my mother in laws neighborhood and found three little student desks. The cheap metal and particle board kind you find in elementary school classrooms. For several months now I have been trying to find a classroom supply store that will not ship them to me but not charge me almost as much for shipping as the price of the desk. It turns out these desks are only cheap if you order enough to fill a classroom. But then I found three of them in the trash.

They were very dirty and a little rusty. They also needed new desk tops. I gave them a good scrub, repainted the metal, and replaced the tops. I only spent $15 for plywood, $3 for spray paint, and $3 for new screws for a total $21 for 3 desks which is still less than the price of one new desk without shipping.

I decided to leave the chrome legs off until I can find chairs for them to sit on. For now they are the perfect height for the boys if they are sitting on the floor.

My Mothers Incident

So, my mother is going to kill me for posting this picture but Sarah thought this was a good idea so we're blaming this on her. Tuesday my mother was having a great day. She watched the kids for me while I ran errands, helped me clean the house, ate lunch with the babies, and helped me put kids to bed, she was perfectly fine. She said she was a little tired so she went to her room to lay down. About 45 minutes later I found her not breathing with no pulse. I was able to resuscitate her and the paramedics came and took her to the hospital. In the hospital before she was fully aware of what was going on she kept taking off her oxygen mask because it was bugging her. I called home to check on the children and as I was finishing my call I looked over and found her like this. They never could determine what exactly caused it. They aren't sure why she was fine one minute and not the next but she seems to be okay now except she will have to sleep with a machine that forces her to breathe and she will have to use oxygen from now on. They are keeping her in the hospital for a few more days due to unrelated insulin issues she has been having but she should be home this weekend. I've tried twice to have the playroom turned into a bedroom for her but both times the people who were supposed to build it have flaked out (one after being paid) but I've decided not to do it after all because if there had been a door there I would have never noticed she wasn't breathing. Oh and we refer to it as her incident now because that's what they kept calling it at the hospital.

The first day of school

On the first day of school I decided I wasn't keeping any extra kids so I wouldn't have to rush home and meet parents. I didn't have to get up at 5am and for the first time in a long time I got to sleep in and actually stayed asleep. I slept so hard I slept through the alarm. We rushed around and got every one ready and made it to school just before the tardy bell. When we got to the school the big kids decided to take themselves to class and Zander wanted to do the same but he couldn't carry his own bag. He said it was embarrassing for his mother to walk him to class but his bag weighed as much as he did. When we got into the class it was a different story. He clung to my leg and wouldn't let go. I pealed him off, wished his teacher luck and left him there and for the first time ever he didn't cry and freak out. On his first day of pre-k he didn't speak to me until after dinner and only talked to me because he had to tell me that one of the other kids bit him. On his first day of kindergarten daddy had to take him to school because he was already freaking out. On the first day of first grade he was crying so hard he made other kids in his class cry. It took about 45 minute to get him to calm down enough for me to leave. But this year he didn't even cry and by day two it was embarrassing for him to be dropped of at school by his mother.

Confession - this isn't actually the first day of school picture because I forgot to charge the batteries to the camera, it isn't the second day either because Tuesday was when my mother had her incident, and it isn't the third day because I was still at the hospital with my mother when my kids left for school. This picture was taken on the fourth day of school before I sent my children to bed because it was a horrible, terrible, no good, very bad week.

The birds

Okay today while washing the dishes and talking on the phone I looked out the kitchen window and saw a ton of birds in the empty lot next to my house but when I went out to take a picture they all flew away. When I turned around there were more just hanging out on the roof of my house.

We had some leftover bird seeds from a scout project of Tanners last month so I threw it out in the grass so the birds can have a little snack.

Happy Birthday Dad & Brendan

Our first day in Mississippi we went out to dinner to celebrated Oscars and Brendan's birthdays. When my brother suggested we go to a place called Shady's for dinner I was a little apprehensive but he assured me it was a family friendly restaurant. It was a little weird though because when we got there we were told they couldn't accommodate parties larger than 6 guests and they had a policy against putting tables together. I wish they had mentioned this when my brother called. It was a little awkward having to sit at different tables and try to talk back and forth between the tables. We made it work though because after 11 hours on the road we were all to tired and hungry to try to find another place to eat.