The Mental Yo-Yo!

I almost feel as if I can appreciate mood swings the likes of which my Bi-Polar son experiences.

Super duper highs one moment to feeling beneath the dirt on your shoes the next.

The highs are incredible and I hold onto them with fervor whenever the lows pop up (which is happening a lot more lately.

One of my super-duper bestest buds called last night telling me her contractor hubby was free Saturday to come help on our home. So we dropped all our less important activities and got to work.

Adios Kitchen!

I’d say it was nice knowing you but I’d be lying. Especially with discovering all the hidden secrets you’ve been keeping in your closet over the past couple of years.

Be warned – If it’s anywhere near meal-time you will not want to view these next few visuals.
You may loose your appetite for an entire week. I nearly lost lunch seeing this after we ripped the counters out. Eewwww!

The rot was so bad under the dishwasher that once the vinyl was up you could stick a finger through all layers of floor without really trying.

So the highs had to be that fact that we are actually moving towards resolving this mess, the lows are seeing how bad it is.

Highs – Good friends who volunteer to help. Yes there are angels among us.

Lows – It’s still ugly and we have no sink for the immediate future.

Had another whammy when Erik went to work to pick up our truck. We’ve kept it at his work for a couple of weeks to dry it out – it tends to get wet with no back window in it and you live in the pacific northwest.

Well the whammy came when he went into the parking garage this morning and the truck was missing.

He had forgot to leave his employee parking permit in the window and security had the blasted truck towed. They have our license number on file – you think they could have called. Nope.
So towing fee + daily $60 impound fee (And they are closed over the weekends as well, so we automatically have to wait until Monday to get our hands on it) Cost = $500plus!!! Poor Prince Erik is kicking himself so hard he might leave bruises.

I’m laughing right now – not crying like a normal person would be. I’m also grilling my kids to see who broke the mirror or walked under a ladder because you just can’t get such bad luck. This will be one year end that will live in infamy in our family’s memories. The Winter everything went wrong. EVERYTHING! But it will pass.

So I went to our church’s Relief Society party feeling all ‘Wo Is Me’, blah, blah, and cursing my horrible luck and making my friends suffer through my whining. I was channeling the Grinch to a T. My turning point was when our Ladies president started going piece by piece through the symbols of the nativity.

Then it happened, I got a wonderful Ah-Ha, Ding-Ding-Ding-Ding moment.

Sure my house has humbled me to my knees over the past few weeks. But in doing so I’ve received an amazing gift. For a moment, at the party, I gained an even bigger appreciation for how I’ve been given this amazing experience to share with my Children.

Grinch, “Maybe Christmas,” he thought, “doesn’t come from a store”. “Maybe Christmas… perhaps…means a little bit more!”

Maybe it’s remembering the most humble Christmas ever. The first Christmas! You can’t get much humbler than giving birth to the Savior of the World in a smelly animal stable.

So believe it or not I’m excited, grinning my goofy grin because I tasted the true meaning of Christmas. And I’m going to hang onto it for all it’s worth. And I’ll try my darndest to help my kids see the beauty of a simple Christmas.

And what happened then…?
Well…in Who-ville they say
That the Grinch’s small heart
Grew three sizes that day!

It just get's better and better.

So I haven’t been having one of those days, I’ve been having one of those months.

I’m trying, I’m really trying to stay positive. But then little things like this happen.

Insurance called today. They aren’t even going to send someone out to our home to look at the kitchen damage because,

‘We don’t cover slow leaks only catastrophic, big honkin, fire hydrant pipe bursting ones that spew at least 15 gallons of water a second. Who cares if it’s not your fault and you didn’t have a camera installed in your wall to detect the start of your homes downward spiral. And since the contractor couldn’t even determine the cause of the damage it won’t do us any good to send someone out. So fork over the bucks, tear your home apart and if once the walls come down you find a LEAK that spills out say more than a tiny leak would then you can consider calling us back because we may or may not help you then.'

Prince Erik is going to call the guy back and see if he can’t have more luck than I did, but it’s not looking hopeful.

So I’m envisioning ‘Extreme-Home-Make-Over-Demolition-Type-Party for the kitchen. Anyone want to come take out their aggressions on my cabinets, floors and walls – Just let me know? Otherwise I’ll be picturing our Homeowners Insurance Company with each and every $22,000 swing.

That and it looks as if I’ll really have to get another job other than my real one of being a mom.

O.K. my pity-party is over. I’m fine now. Thanks for letting me rant.

Ummm, Take Two!

Oh, My Honk!!!


Who do-ya suppose made this mess? My Giving Tree didn’t even make it 24 hours. Sheezzz!

Well now you know why breakables aren’t something that last too long around these parts.

Being a wee bit scatterbrained like I normally am, I first put our little tree on a small table at the bottom of the stairs knowing full well that dirty clothes get tossed over the edge periodically throughout the day.

Apparently someone with poor aim tossed a heavy towel over the edge and it caught enough branches to send it to the floor. The glass vase was shattered to near dust. Good news is that the glass marbles were nigh indestructible. Who'd have thunk?

And who was that someone???

Sigh – ME!!! See my kids are doomed.

So I found a new base – Glass, because you know I love to tempt fate that way. Fixed the tree back up and put it in the furthest corner of the room where only the dust mites hang out.

Then I loaded the entry table with kid friend nativities that could handle a few knock-downs over the course of the month.

I can almost guarantee that they will find the floor sooner rather than later.

So tonight, our family read the story of ‘The Littlest Angel’ by Charles Tazewell, for our family service project, and talked about how the simplest gifts can often be the best.

Then after opening another bag on the tree we scoured the house looking for loose change.

We are going to donate it to ‘The Heifer Project’. It’s one of the fundraisers that are going on at my girl’s school. Actually there are several charitable causes petitioning school families to contribute to. The reason I choose this one was because it revolves around the oldie but goodie phrase of.

‘Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, Teach him to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.’

The farm girl in me loves that this organization gives farm animals to impoverished people around the world and teaches them lessons on how to use the animals to become more self-reliant and contribute to their families and communities. And finally they are taught how to pass their livestock’s offspring on to another person in need.

So, after we cleaned out the laundry room, cars, couch cushions, purses, and coat pockets we were able to come up with a small cupful of change to donate. I know with the purse strings being tight in a lot of households giving $ is hard to do. But every little penny helps. If everyone donates their loose change for one month, imagine how many people around the world would benefit from a good cause.

After our money dig we let the kids have a cup of hot chocolate topped with mini marshmallows and a Hershey’s Chocolate Mint Candy Cane. Just a little bit of heaven for the taste buds. See even Abner agrees.

Only I didn’t take into account that the sugar would spazz up my kids something fierce right at bedtime. You’d think I’d have learned that lesson by now. Oh well.

The Giving Tree

Ahhhhhhh! It's December already. Tonight we kicked off our Month of December with ‘A Giving Tree’.



Last Month of Gratitude was just what I needed. And I intend to keep it going for the unforeseeable future.

This month we are trying as a family to focus on the Spirit of Christmas. Yes we are having a simple Christmas but that isn’t going to stop us from going all out on inviting the Spirit of Christmas into our home.

In looking back at childhood Christmas’s and some of our families favorites of years past there is one thing that sticks out. You’ll have to agree that it’s no shocker that it isn’t the gifts that we receive that we remember best, but the family experiences that we share. So this month our herd is Giving Away Christmas Spirit each and every day for the entire month. How do you give the Spirit of Christmas?

Charity, Service, Love are just a few of the things we are going to share.

Remember my tree’s dying branches that I used for some autumn decorations?

I stripped the leaves off, used some leftover white spray paint.

Then we stuck them in an old vase with some of my daughter’s magic jewels (Glass pebbles) that were lying around.

Of course, I Smacked them on a table on top of a pretty snowflake table runner that I got during last years after-Christmas sales. Can I say I’m partial to silver, white and blue? They have to be some of my favorite non-traditional Christmas colors.

Then we placed some simple $1 store ornaments on the simple branches.

On the limbs are 24 of these sweet beaded bags...

(Wedding section, folks) these bags will each hold an act of family service (written on a paper of all things). Every day a different family member will pick a bag then as a family we will complete the service mentioned on the paper.



As an extra incentive we read this sweet little story by Paula Palangi McDonald called, ‘The Last Straw.’




It’s about a family of kids who can’t seem to get along so they make a manger and add a straw to it for every secret service that they give each other. One poor kid gets the name of the one sibling he has the hardest time getting along with. And he gets it every single week. The last week when he gets the same name, he has a mini breakdown…

“I tried to be nice to her, Mom. Even when she saw that the crib leg was too short and called me a dummy for it later, I didn’t hit her. And every week, when we picked new names I thought it would be over. But tonight, when I got her name again, I knew I couldn’t do one more nice thing for her. Mom, I just can’t! If I try, I’ll probably punch her instead. And tomorrow’s Christmas Eve. If I beat up Kelly, I’ll spoil Christmas for everybody just when we’re ready to put Baby Jesus in the crib.”

The whole hitting a punching rang a bell with me for some odd reason.

In the mom’s reply was this,

“You gave your love when it wasn’t easy to give. Maybe that’s what the spirit of Christmas is really all about.”

Hum, maybe, just maybe in helping our kids give service they just might manage to catch some of that Spirit of Christmas in their hearts. I’ll try anything to get a little less contention and a little more love anyday.

So we pulled out this manger...

We made years ago for a church play and the kids collected dried weeds (that could pass for straw) from the road side. And tonight we started filling our own manger for the Christ child. A Straw for every act of service.

Some of the random acts of service that we may do over the next few weeks include some of these ideas. I’m still trying to pin down some really big service projects and if they happen I’ll tell you about them later.

1. Babysit for a Friend so they can go Christmas Shopping.
2. Make bird feeders out of pinecones, peanut butter and bird seeds for the neighborhood birds.
3. Cheer up a sick friend with a visit or phone call.
4. Plant a tree.
5. Clean up trash in a local park.
6. Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. Donate unused items to a local Thrift Store.
7. Take a meal to a family with a new baby.
8. So secret acts of service around your own home.
9. Donate to your favorite charity.
10. Donate to your second favorite charity.
11. Buy toys for local foster kids.
12. Write letters of appreciation to friends and family.
13. Sing carols and had out homemade Christmas cards at a local senior center. (I’m counting on them to be slightly deaf or there’s no way we can pull this one off.
14. Go Christmas caroling around the neighborhood.
15. Be involved in school and church holiday programs.

And more.

So those are just a few of the ideas we might try on our Giving Tree! And I’m excited about this whole idea.

What are some of the things you all are doing to bring the Spirit of Christmas into your homes this year???

Off Came Her Head!

So we got our Christmas pictures back. I ordered online a nice family pose...

And a goofy one for kicks. Got enough to send out to all our friends and family. Sadly, they chopped off my head and totally washed out the nice photo. Kind of made it look like it was not centered at all.

So if you happen to grace my mailing list, you’re getting the goofs this year. I know I could complain and force them to make good and send us a better image, but I’ve got much bigger fish to fry.

And the room in which we would fry those fish is getting scarier by the day. We had a couple of contractors come look at our kitchen… Not good… One contractor actually looked a little scared at the damage and said he couldn’t honestly give us an estimate because he wasn’t sure if the source of the leak was in the plumbing or roof (via the wall). He wouldn’t know until he actually started to rip it apart. The other contractor gave us a fix-it bid of…

Wait for this…

On second thought you may want to just skip the rest of the post – it’s that good.

$22,500.00!!!

No you don’t need to get your eyes checked. Twenty Two Thousand Plus!!! I could buy a home in a trailer park for that much. He said there’s a good chance the insurance company would cover a majority of the fix but I haven’t had that good of an experience with our insurance company to find out yet.

Apparently there’s a lot of dry rot and the problems been going on for quite a while and we finally discovered it when the floor started getting soft in front of the sink. Not only are they going to have to rip out counters, floor, subfloor, but they are also going to have to replace some of the major floor joist's (whatever those things are).

Folks, this home isn’t that old. It’s only 17 years old and it’s acting like a 30 to 40 year old house.
I know, I know – Happy Thoughts!

So when all is said and done I’m going to have a new kitchen!

Our family participated in our first ever Black Friday yesterday. Of course we split up – A Boy Car and a Girl Car. Prince Erik and our three boys stayed up all night at Best Buy and were able to get the items they wanted. The experience would have been good but the group behind them was having a drinking party and ended up hurling all over everything by morning. Not to mention they were extremely obnoxious and pushy.

Wait, here it comes, I’m grateful that my boys got an excellent lesson in abstaining from alcoholic beverages.

The girls and I braved the crafty coupon wielding crowd at JoAnn’s and I was able to get some needed items at over 75% off. Wahoo. We didn’t really get hardly anything for Christmas but we were able to take advantage of the super discounted items without being sucked into paying for extras that weren’t needed.

All in all it was a good experience. We might do it again next year.

Blah, Blah, Blah… I could go on and on. Tell you about our peaceful Thanksgiving or my evening out with the girls. But I’m working on a secret project.

A Secret Surprise!

One I hope to have done in the next couple of weeks. Kind of like a big Christmas Present for all of you. And my Husband – Prince that he is – well, he’s giving me tons of time to work on it. If I get lazy and back off, he supportively encourages me to get working on it again. I’m beginning to wonder if aliens have abducted him and messed with his brain. He’s actually taking over the kids and house because he wants me to work on this surprise. What husband does that?

I couldn’t neglect my blog though so I’m sneaking this post in as he is off running errands.

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and are well on your way to a calm and peaceful Christmas free of the hustle and bustle. Hey, it doesn’t hurt to dream!

So today I put away all my Thanksgiving and Autumn decorations.

And we started working on a couple of decorating projects. Involving Free sticks and leftover spray paint. Here's a sneak peak. I'll show you the finished project when it just that - Finished.

But right now I'm off to work on my surprise.

And next time I promise a SHORTER Post!

Get off the Computer!

Step Away from the Computer.

You shouldn't be on it. Maybe you could step outside and enjoy one of these here Beauties!

Or stay inside and snuggle with your kiddo's.

Please don't tell me your as addicted to blogging as I am.

Geezzzz! It's Thanksgiving already. You know the time to be thankful for family and friends.

What are you still doing checking out my post. I could go on and on about the multitude of stuff I'm Thankful for but instead I'm actually going to spend that time with my family. O.K.

P.S. You should do the same.

Oh, and before you go. I just want to take the time to Thank you for being my blog friends, commenter's and lurkers. I really appreciate you stopping in every now and then to say Hi.

Hope you all have a wonderful Holiday and don't stuff yourself too much. See you in a couple of days.

Keen Give-away at DYM

The ever-and-always Awesome Daring Young Mom is having a super KEEN Giveaway right now. You could score some nifty shoes for you or anyone in your family. Or pick out a really happening bag instead.

I'm so breaking the covet commandment right now. So check out the company website here. Pick your favorite item and then visit Kathryn and leave a comment on which item you drool over the most and you could win it.

Then you could stick it under the tree and pretend Santa didn't have to tighten his pursestrings after-all.