controlled chaos

That's my life, controlled chaos, and sometimes a lot of uncontrolled chaos! Monday afternoon I took our suburban in to get the door handles on it fixed!!! FINALLY!!!!! That only took a year!!

When I took it in, I found out that after the handles were fixed, I would need to take it to a separate body shop of theirs and get the hinges fixed. So I took it over there, got the estimate and made arrangements to drop it of Tues night, the next night, and they would fix it Wed. I was at the garage from 2ish to about 5pm.

In the meantime, I had made arrangements to take the Geo in to have it's door looked at, so they could order the right parts to fix it, the next afternoon (Tuesday). So I got in it to take it and quickly realized I probably would not be driving it back home! The check engine light was going off and on and it was running really, really rough. When I got to the garage my fears were confirmed. Our little four cylinder car was only running on TWO!! So I asked for a rental because we were down to the truck for vehicles and that wasn't going to work! They really had to search for one, as the regular ones were all out. In the meantime Mom was coming from her errands in GB to the garage in TR to drop it off for me and ride home with me.....except I had no car!

They did find me one and we were able to make it home. So once again I was at the garage from 2ish to 5ish. Do you know what's on TV at that time of day? Nothing worth watching!!!

Tuesday night we looked at Collin's nose again and it was not straight anymore. So we thought we better get it checked after all. So four phone calls later, I had an appt. for him at 1:50pm. Mom wanted Than to do some ice chipping and box moving at her house, so I told her she'd have to take the whole gang, as I couldn't leave Lee, Jayden and Max home alone! So after dropping them off, we went to the dr.

They took x-rays and in the end decided a CAT scan would be a good idea. But they couldn't get us in until 4:15pm. Collin and I decided to hang out at the library, as I didn't have the energy to drive home and drive back into town. On the way to the CAT scan I got the call that the burb could be picked up. So I made arrangements to get it dropped off at the first garage, because I couldn't get to the body shop by 5pm.

The CAT scan indicates that Collin has no broken nose, and no deviated septum. Thank goodness.

Then we got to drive over to the dealership and once again I was there at 5pm! (I was wrong, the appt went so fast we could have been there at 5pm, but there was no way to know that and we were there at like 5:01) We traded the rental for our burb and were very excited to find that the doors worked like new!! So nice, no more rolling down the window and then ramming our shoulder into the door like a football player to get it open! It's the little things in life.

Today I got a call at 9:30am that the Geo was ready!! I had to take Max into the clinic to get his ear rechecked and then Mom, Max and I went off to retrieve the Geo. Max's ear looks perfect by the way, the ear drum had burst over Christmas break. While I was there my Nurse Practitioner (NP) heartily endorsed my plan to go spend two weeks in AZ and told me that I really should take along a NP to make sure I was ok if I had any health issues while I was gone!!!

When I picked up the Geo, the lady at the desk asked me if I was coming back tomorrow! I told her no, it had been nice meeting all of them, but hopefully we'd be done with car repairs for a bit now! We both laughed.

So we have all our cars back and they work just great!! So nice.

Yes, I am going to AZ for two weeks. Kathy, the same Kathy who went to DC with us, has generously opened her home to me and I'm going to spend two weeks in the DRY and mostly WARM climate that is sunny Arizona!! I'm really looking forward to it! I leave this Sunday, and yes I just finalized all this today and bought the tickets today! I can't wait to get there. Did I mention I'm not taking any kids?! I'm going there to get HEALTHY! Kathy said it was cheaper than a hospital bill. I'm just crossing my fingers that it does the trick and I'll finally get rid of this junk.

I just checked the forecast for AZ..............seventy degrees!!!!! Can we say EXCITED!!! Really, really, EXCITED!!!! It's supposed to be -6 in actual temps next week here in WI, as in NO windchill is factored into that, and there is almost always a windchill, so really it's probably going to be -15 or lower!!! AND I WON'T BE HERE!!!! Ok, ok, maybe a I'm gloating just a teeny bit.....but I'm going to be WARM and gloating!!

the verdict

Collin's nose does not appear broken, as the swelling goes down. He's says it's still tender if bumped, but that's it. Thank goodness.

I did spend most of Sunday in bed, but I'm still feeling crummy. So we're taking it easy today. Getting back into the groove of school and such. But the boys will be doing the work.

I do have to go feed animals, which entails carrying water buckets, but I'll just take it slow and easy.

Our ground is covered in one massive sheet of ice, everywhere. It's really treacherous. Brent tried to get out of the drive this morning and he got stuck, took him over an hour and a half to dig out. YUCK! The Sahara desert is looking pretty good right now. We're supposed to have windchill temps of -25, I think 125+ temps sound really good!

I do enjoy the winters here and I keep reminding myself that I'd be much happier if I could just get healthy. I did take some oregano yesterday and am off to take it again today. It's supposed to be really good for combating respiratory stuff, so we'll see. But getting it down is a whole nother story!

Have a good day, and if you're temps are positive today, ENJOY them!

Don't Faint!

Yes, I'm actually posting two days in a row! Because I'm in bed and it's not even 6pm. I thought I was getting better and then today I was just dragging and my lungs feel worse, but I'm five days into a round of antibiotics, so how can I be getting worse?

I'm also not sitting in a hot tub right now, which is where I was supposed to be! I did pass on it yesterday, but today decided it would really be worth it. So I took the boys sledding and we were supposed to go swimming afterwards. But Collin's nose hit Jayden's head pretty hard and we had to go home instead.

It's really swollen and there is a slight possibility that it's broken. It's looks a little off center to Brent and I, but it's really swollen, did I mention that? So we're going to let the swelling go down and see what it looks like. When he and Brent feel it and move it, it doesn't seem broken, so we're crossing our fingers that it's just swelling. Lots and lots of swelling. And blood, but you probably already figured that out.

So no hot tub for me.....I got sent to my room, bad mommy. Really I sent myself to my room and Brent agreed, and offered room service! I'm having flashbacks to August. I'd really rather not relive those memories! And honest, I've been good. No snow blowing for me, no shoveling, no unloading pellets, no cleaning house, no running here and there and everywhere....honest I've been good, really, really good. So dangit, this crud needs to GO AWAY!!

And even though my wonderful, awesome hubby delivered dinner, he some how couldn't whip up a bathroom on the second floor in one night, so I'm off to take care of that before I flood the bed, and maybe sneak a peek at Collin's nose. (and if hubby could have whipped up a second floor bathroom in any amount of time, he'd have done it already, believe me!! we both hate the trek down to the bathroom in the middle of the night.)

Hmmmm, not liking this pattern

We are still here, under all the snow. We broke a 121 yr record in December for snowfall, aren't we excited. Maybe a little. And I think I'll just ignore that whole 30 days again, thing.

With all that snow you would think we were having the time of our life. However, the third time out with our snow mobiles we broke one, we actually got it so stuck that it had frozen mud and snow in it and it took us over two weeks to get it back to the house from the cabin, because of Brent and I being sick off and on. So no more playing in the snow with the mobiles. The good news is that our great friend that gave us the snowmobiles came over for New Years and helped us get the one running and get them both home. So after we get a little more ice chunks out of the one and get the key hole to deice on the other, we'll be riding again!

Shortly into Dec., the night before we received over a foot of snow, one of our snow blowers broke. So that entails taking our one remaining blower back and forth between the cabin and the farm. We don't have the funds this month to fix/replace it. And it takes several hours to blow each place, so when it snowed,( and it snowed, and it snowed, and then it snowed again, and then it drifted everywhere, and then it snowed again, ALL MONTH) we were busy blowing it everywhere, so we could get in and out of our driveways and to our animals.

Then Brent and I both got a virus that took us out of commission for about 5 days. So now we're behind and who knows when we'll ever see the gravel of our driveway again!! Maybe in April. The basic premise behind blowing is that not only will you not get your car stuck, (which by the way Brent managed to do this week,) but when the weather does "warm up", you know to like 25 degrees or even a whopping 32, the thin layer of ice/snow that you have on the drive, will melt and you will once again be walking/driving on gravel/concrete. And yes we had a major thaw, but it was the weekend Brent and I were sick, so did we get anything cleared? NO!

Thankfully one of our farmer neighbors is helping us out with his tractor that has not only a front loader, but a gigantic and I do mean gigantic snow blower on the rear. But his idea of when we actually need digging out is a bit different than ours, so we're still dealing with drifts and minor snowfalls, which still takes a lot of time.

So maybe you can see why I've not had time/energy/motivation to post. Because you have to remember that in between the blowing,( which at times has been every day or every other day,) we still have to feed 6 kids, 4 dogs(we've been dog sitting all month), 4 cats, 2 snakes, 2 horses, 2 rabbits and 1 turtle. Oh yeah and 60+ chickens. Then the kids have this thing called school that we're supposed to do everyday, and there's laundry and cleaning and don't forget the things that take us out of the house, such as archery, church, shopping for food (for some reason people in this house insist on eating three+ times a DAY!) and so on and so forth. And I've been sick all of December with one thing or another.

The first week of Dec. we all ended up with a respiratory virus that was miserable. Collin ended up with another ear infection, Max got an ear infection to the point that his ear drum burst, and Amanda had to go to the Dr. to prove to her that she wasn't coming down with bronchitis again and that she really could go back to school. I got to go visit the Dr this week because the stuff in my head had decided that it was bored being there and moved into my lungs. So now I'm on antibiotics. But the x-rays show no pneumonia, we checked just in case.

I'm now turning my kids into germaphobics and I and the two youngest are not going to church until we're 100% better. The house is becoming a sterile place to live, you know as in bleach, anitbacterial sprays, and anything else I can think of to keep germs at bay.

We've explored a lot of angles on why it's been such a really bad 6 mths of respiratory issues(I actually haven't been 100% healthy since June 12th) and we're still not finding any clear cut answers. We moved out of the house for 5 days in August and it didn't help, we've had the house examined for mold and other issues. Than was seen by an allergist and given a battery of allergy tests. We've all taken rounds of allergy meds, and used essential oils and we're currently on high doses of vit C. We just do not know. Even with six kids we've never passed stuff around before, and I've never had kids with ear issues, till now. So we'll keeping working at getting healthy and hopefully we'll find something that works. I'm thinking garlic is going to be added soon.

And now I'm tired remembering all that!! We did have a good Christmas, Brent and I were still recovering, but able to do all the usual stuff. We've had a good two weeks off with the kids. Today we're off to sled with a friend and then go swimming, I'm thinking I'm going to sit in the hot tub, maybe....it's awful cold when you get out!!

NOT AGAIN??!!!

Man, I can not believe I've done another 30 days with out blogging. There's probably no one reading it anymore! But if there is, here's a day in my life courtesy of the stacks on my counter. This was the Wednesday before Tday. Which by the way, we had a lovely Thanksgiving Day.

So I'm starting from left to right and going around the kitchen. This is right after we'd unloaded the car.

On the left we have the silver bowl, from having collected eggs the night before. Somehow my counter has this magical force field that keeps items on it unmovable. It is resting on a package of envelopes, purchased to mail the Thanksgiving Cards that the boys made for their Grandparents. They got mailed the day before. The weird blue square is a video game, not sure why it landed there, but again that force field has come into force.

I'm sure you recognize the Kleenex box and flashlight, that is their home, along with the wooden bowl, which holds who knows what at any given time! Between the flashlight and Kleenex is a CO2 monitor, that is supposed to be hung up in the house, but has fallen victim to that dang force field!

The paper bag is Amanda's lunch, well it was her lunch, and she forgot it. Then for some reason, she took her sandwich out, but left the bag!!! The acorn squash is from our garden and for dinner the next day. The wicker things are paper plate holders and I can not remember why they were out, but obviously the poor things are victims to the FF.

The cans and cheese are from unloading the car. The jars on the back wall also live their, along with the toaster. I really can't tell you why the glasses or scissors are there, but I'm telling ya, the Force is strong in this counter!

Moving on we have a cool whip container, also from having just shopped and two bottles of sparkling cider. The bag holds food for the two dogs we're dog sitting for the holiday weekend.

Again we have another victim of the FF, an OJ can, poor lost soul. Then we have homemade bread, made by Brent!! NOT ME!! He took Monday off and thoughtfully made up a batch of bread, as we were low and he knew I wasn't going to get to it anytime soon. It's home is in the iron basket behind it, but given the FF in action, this is pretty dang close!!

We have a medicine bottle behind the bread that is ANOTHER victim of the FF. It's owner was trying to figure out dosing as the pharmacy thoughtfully gave us a mg dropper with ml directions and it took our resident chemist, Brent to figure out an accurate dose. That only took three days!

The package in the iron basket is a package of yogurt covered pretzels that I ate for lunch that day, as I got behind and didn't get lunch. I think the kids made me a sandwich, but then someone ate it, thinking I'd eaten or didn't want it......
Then we have an XS can, that is a decaff energy drink, that's what kept me going while I unloaded the car. The Wal-mart bag is more dog food/meds for the visiting dogs. The other bag is groceries from the car. The crock pot is sitting in it's corner home.

We have a cookie sheet with scissors on it because I went down to put something in the freezer and discovered the door had not been closed completely and the top door shelves were defrosted. The veggies sat on the counter for two days, before I acknowledged I wasn't going to get to them and Collin took them out on the cookie sheet and cut them open, that morning. The real miracle here is that the cookie sheet AND scissors made it back out of the chicken house! It has it's own peculiar FF.

We have misc. dishes that hadn't been washed yet that evening. The bottles with weird caps are rabbit water bottles that get to come visit every day to thaw out while their counterparts are out in the rabbit cages, slowly freezing in preparation for their indoor visit.

The wire basket is sitting there because Collin uses it to put his eggs into while he's getting ready to clean them. He was in the act of cleaning them while I was taking the pictures. The giant blue bottle in the back is a gallon container of commercial dish soap. I'm tired of replacing bottles all the time. We wash dishes three times a day and it uses up those regular bottles fast.
Here we have the dishes that did get washed, although if I was to really think about it, they're probably victims also, as they were probably washed the day before! The stack of pizza's in the front are for dinner, as I'd been gone for three days straight at this point and needed a quick dinner! Then on the stove, we have eggs cooking.....no wait that's not right.....oh yeah they're DRYING on the stove, of course.
And finally we have the turkey I bought for a great deal. He just hadn't made it into the fridge yet. Behind him we have a butternut squash, whom I'm sad to say is another victim, he's been there a couple of weeks. Under them is my shopping list, that of course didn't make it into town with me......
So now you know that this week I was so busy, Brent had to make bread, and that I was gone every day until Tday.

I was in town to shop and to pick up dogs, which is really simplifying, because while in town I went to the dentist for Collin, to Fleet Farm for rubber boots for Collin and water heaters for the chickens, to two grocery stores for food and to my friend's house to pick up the dogs. I was running behind because that morning we were at the Dr.'s office for Lee to get a few warts frozen and a 1/2 hr appt. turned into 1 1/2 hrs, because the office had an emergency come in right after we got into the room and so we sat in there for an hour while they dealt with that.

So, yes life's been a little over the top busy, but now it should settle down again. Earlier in the month I focused on staying home every single morning and doing bookwork with Than every single morning, as he's moved onto actual formal book work and we weren't getting it done, due to appts and such going on. So I've been focused on not scheduling anything for before 12pm and that's working great.

I've also finally gotten the large parts of the house straightened out and organized, so that streamlines much and after I tweak three closets, I'll be golden.

We've mostly gotten the outside animals lined out for the winter too. The horses still need stalls, but they do have a very large area to come into the barn and get out of the weather, so we may give up on individual stalls and just leave it that way this year.

So maybe you'll see me more than once, this coming month!!

new member of the family

I'm amazed or ashamed, your choice, that it's been 30 days since my last post! Holy Cow.

So one of the reasons is the newest member of our family. If you read Mom's blog you already know about him. If you don't, here he is.

His name is Leo, he's 23 and gray with freckles. If you ask Max, his name IS Freckles.....
He came to us for free, we are his retirement home and we're thrilled to have him! He's fitting right in. It's been wonderful rediscovering this side of myself again. The kids are all thrilled to have me on a horse next to them. We're covering more ground and riding more regularly and they love that. We have to have assigned days for them to ride!

I've been tagged.

My sister-in-law Shelly over at http://lunchladychronicles.blogspot.com/ tagged me....something I haven't had happen to me yet.

So here goes......

Here are the rules

1. Link the person who tagged you.

2. Mention the rules on your blog.

3. Tell 6 unspectacular quirks you posses.

4. Tag 6 following bloggers by linking them.

5. Leave a comment on each of the blogs, letting them know they have been tagged.

Now here are unspectacular quirks I posses:

1. I like everything in my fridge to go back in the same exact spot. I mean the EXACT spot. Doesn't mean it happens.....

2. I love to mow the grass. And vacuum. I think it gives me instant gratification.

3. If I'm not driving, I prefer to read, I will engage in conversation, just that given a choice, I'll read.

4. The lids on my toilets have to be down if they're not in use.

5. My floors have to be clean. The counters, tables, shelves and couches can be stacked miles high and I can ignore them, but the floors have to be clear of anything and preferably vacuumed or swept.

6. My kids have to wear "town" clothes when we go anywhere. I have been known to make them change more than once before we leave. Town clothes have no holes or stains and let the general public know that I can afford to have six kids.

Now I'm supposed to tag six people.....yeah, like I know six people who have blogs who have the time to post about their quirks! This one took me all of Sept. to come up with! So I'm going to pass on this part......

end of the month.....WHAT???

How can it be the end of the month?!!! I've spent the last four days enjoying the company of my Mother and Father-in-law! We had such a great time! They came late Friday night and left this morning, on Tuesday. We spent Sat. morning getting the chicken pens set up and in the afternoon we went to the lake. The lake was FRIGID!! But the boys had a great time and we enjoyed watching them.

Sat. night we had a bar-b-que at the cabin. Brent grilled hamburgers and chicken. Mom made potatoe salad and we had all the fixins, including fresh tomatoes and onions out of the garden. We roasted marshmellows over a fire and just enjoyed some down time.

Sunday we went to church, after I made waffles for Than's birthday breakfast. Then for lunch we had brats and more potatoe salad. Then everyone but me hung out at the house, watching the Packer game. I went with my Mom and brother to watch him work a horse at our neighbors. He's here for two weeks and it's been fun to watch him work the different horses and he's worked with the boys with Nebby.

Sunday evening we had lasagna and birthday cake, that Brent made. Then after a round of hand and foot, we had raspberry mousse that Brent also made. This was supposed to be just Than's treat, as most of us are not fans of raspberries. However it was so good that we all had some!!

Monday, Brent and his Dad put up the rabbit cages in the chicken barn, so we can move the rabbits indoors for the winter. I had a dentist appt., so the boys entertained Sharleen with their bow and arrow skills and I'm not sure what all else!

When I came home, we headed to the cabin so that Jayden could make peanut butter cookies with Grandma Candy, for Jay. We, we being Jay and Sharleen, with a little help from Lee, Collin and I, picked 3 buckets full of tomatoes. I also got a pan full of cucumbers, and just realized I forgot to get to the brocolli!! Uh oh.....

Monday evening Sharleen treated us to a dinner at the Ponderosa, a family buffet restraunt.

This morning we sadly took Jay and Sharleen to Milwaukee so they could catch a train and go to Michigin to visit Merrill's family.

Brent is now on nights until the end of Oct. So I'll be very busy this month, as mostly I'll be the only parent available to handle stuff. He does have Saturday night off, which really doesn't give us much time with him, but it does give us some.

Shaving cream fun.

Brent and I were moving the office and school room around and we really needed to keep Max and Jayden out of our hair, so we sent them outside with some shaving cream cans leftover from our last shaving cream fight. Here is the result.

Max impersonating Elvis!

I am going to get you!

Lee singing, I am the champion!

Three very happy boys.

Are you tired?

You might be when you get done reading what all I did yesterday!!

I got up before the kids so that I could exercise on the Wii for half an hour, of course Max got up and I had to escort him back to bed as it was much to early for him to be up. Then I showered, dressed etc...

I put together some notebooks for the boys, and got breakfast started. It was a pot of oatmeal. Did a load of laundry and supervised the boys doing their chores.

Ate breakfast, did clean up/chores. Had family scripture study/prayer and started school. Did another load of laundry.

Did what is becoming the norm, got all the kids set-up and spent the rest of the time either keeping up with them or organizing school stuff. Then I got lunch made, directed clean-up/chores and laid down with Max to take a nap, I was already tired!!

Got up before he did and made phone calls, and took care of paperwork. When he got up we went to the cabin to pull more nails and take the garage further apart. I helped Than get the horse ready and got him on, supervised his riding while I picked tomatoes, cucumbers, broccoli and flowers. Then we came home for dinner.

Dinner was chicken teriyaki with rice and fresh steamed broccoli. Then the older kids left with Brent to pull more of the garage apart. I stayed home with a very cranky Max and cleaned up from dinner and did some planning. Then the crew came home and we had family prayer, got teeth brushed, showed Dad what the kids did in school and got everyone tucked in and snuggled. Then Brent and I planned for today and FINALLY it was time for us to go to bed!!

Tired yet....I was!! Today it's more of the same, except we have piano from 10:15 to 12:00. But we're very blessed, the piano teacher comes HERE, to our house!! Than and Collin are continuing their lessons and Lee is getting started this year. Then this evening I have a meeting at the high school for a trip to Ecuador that Amanda is taking next summer, and Brent has some meetings at church.

Three Weeks!!!

Oh my.......it's hard for me to believe it's been three weeks since my last post. Can you tell I've gotten out of bed for good?!!

Let's see, what's been going on......maybe you don't want to hear about it....then I don't have to play catch up......hmmm. I guess I could just give you the highlights.

Mom had her surgery, she is doing great, recovering well. Maybe not as fast as she'd like, but still doing well. The pathology report was negative for any cancer, they removed it all when the did the colonoscopy, but there is no way to know that they got it all in the colonascopy for sure without the surgery. The negative results were wonderful and we feel very blessed to know the Heavenly Father is looking out for us.

Kathy was here for two weeks and that was so wonderful. She took complete and total care of Mom, my only concern was finding time to visit at the hospital! We were very sad to send her home, but Kathy's social life just wouldn't allow her to stay! Trent, her son was married over the weekend, and this week she and Larry find out about a surgery for Larry.

While Mom was at the hospital we got to spend four days at the local resort, we had a minor smoking incident with the furnace on Sunday afternoon, and we wanted to test whether the house was actually affecting us or not. As we still hadn't had a day where all eight of us were healthy since June 12th. The only one it made a difference for was Brent and we're pretty sure it was allergies for him, not a mold or other issue in the house.

I also went back to the Dr. to get lung x-rays again, as I thought I had pneumonia, again. But thankfully I didn't. The boys all came down with a virus right after I got out of bed in August, so that contributed to my illness. I was very, very good and took it easy for weeks after I got out of bed, so it was frustrating to be so sick again!

While at the resort, we had people come in to fix the furnace, which was a motor on a fan, and we had some people come in to see if they thought we had a mold issue. They didn't think we had a mold issue, but we do have a water issue in both bathrooms. So now we're waiting on insurance to see if it will pay for replacing the floors of both baths and the kitchen, as the water is a couple of feet into the kitchen. They have a nifty little gadget that tells them these things. It's not standing water per se, it's that the underboards are damp/wet.

The first week of Sept. Amanda went back to school, the boys started a more structured routine again, and Brent worked 12+ hrs a day doing a work week. Can I say how happy I am that he's not doing that anymore!! This was just a fill in for his former department, while they trained a new guy.

Last week Brent took the week off, except Wed. and we worked on winterizing the cabin and farm. You can see some of what we did over at Mom's blog. (Grandma Cancy's blog, in the side bar) At the farm we FINALLY made progress on the garage. Just one large pile of stuff in the middle and then some boxes on the shelves to go through!! YEAH!!! That was driving me CRAZY.

And during that time we had fifteen new baby chicks hatch out and added four more hens to the nesting boxes to sit on four eggs each.

We still have things to do, but we're hopeful we'll be able to get them done, as they will not take as much time as the stuff we got done last week. We need to get them done quickly as you never know when the weather will turn cold, and then it's miserable to work in. One year we had snow in late Oct.!

So this week we're back to real life. Brent is off to work, and we're back into the structure of a routine.

Bedroom Makeover

Here is the one picture I've managed to get of our bedroom. The dresser at the foot of the bed and the window trim are actually a very light minty green, emphasis on light. Most people who see them in person call them white, until they look closely. I have yet to do anything about window treatments or wall decorations. Someday.

Right now my time has been taken up with changing up our main floor living spaces. The kitchen got a "new" table. It's the table from the school room, it was originally given to us for the kitchen, but at that time I did not have enough chairs to go around it, now I do (they were given to us free), even if they don't match. I'm hoping to come across some benches for the long sides of the table, but for now what we have works for us.

The office moved to the school room and the office room became a den. We do not have a whole room devoted to a school room at this point, the kids never worked in it. I hand out their work and they disappear to their rooms or all of them go to one room......anything we need a table for is usually done in the kitchen any way.

Here is the bedroom picture and then I'll tell you a little more about life here lately.


I also moved living room furniture around, but not anything drastic, just a refining of the area.

I've been working on the house for two weeks, maybe more, I can't remember, and it's very slow going for me!! I don't have my stamina back yet, so I'm hampered by that. Then of course there's all this other stuff that people think they need, like meals and clothes and to be taken to their activities! Actually the kids have been wonderful and Mom, Brent and the kids kept the house very well while I was in bed. But it had already fallen into chaos because I never finished unpacking and getting a place assigned for everything. That's what I'm working on now, and purging the house. I'm not a keeper, I'm a thrower, the problem with that for the moment is that everything is landing in the garage. The garage that the kids and Mom cleaned and organized in June, for Brent's Father's Day.....it makes me sick to see it right now.

We had to empty the basement due to water issues and that is all in the garage also. Yes, it's a mess, a very big mess.....but it'll get better, someday.

Back to the den, I painted the den last week, or was it the week before......I think it was both! And it now has an air hockey table in it. It was given to us last Tuesday by a family whose kids had outgrown it. And it's why we have a den and not a homeschooling room....well mostly, I was already leaning towards not doing a full out school room in the old office room. So that just made my decision easy! I painted the den the reverse colors of my room, cause that's the amount of paint I had leftover. The walls are the light mint color and the window and door trim is the blue color, then we did the baseboard trim in the same blue/white color we used on our bedroom ceiling. Maybe you'll get a picture of that.....and maybe you won't!

This week has been taken up with Mom and her surgery. We had her surgeon consult on Monday, scheduled surgery for Thursday. Her best friend Kathy flew in on Tuesday. Wed. I recovered from coming home at 2am in the morning after picking up Kathy at the airport (she was a victim of the FFA misfortune that happened Tuesday.) Thursday Mom had her surgery and today I spent the morning spinning in circles.....well not really, it just felt like that. This afternoon I went to the hospital with Amanda. Kathy took Amanda and they went off school shopping, school starts the 2nd for her, and I stayed with Mom. Kathy enjoyed her break from the hospital and Amanda enjoyed huge success at the sales today. So we were all happy.

Also making us happy and having us feel very, very blessed is that last week we got not only an air hockey table, but Wed. Brent brought home a 42 inch TV and Thursday he brought home a freezer, and a front loading washer and dryer set. The washer stopped working on the family and they don't know why. Brent has some talent in troubleshooting washers, so we'll see if that will work with a front loading machine. If not, our local washer repair shop will look it over and see if it's worth our while to fix. I would love to have a front loading machine and even a repair fee will be cheaper than a new set!! So you can see why we feel so blessed. We had run out of freezer space due to the 50 lbs of green beans we froze over the last three weeks. And this freezer showed up in the nick of time, as I was seriously thinking about tracking one down and buying it.

I know I'm destined for chaos while I have so many kids in the house, but usually it's organized chaos and right now.........not so much. So be patient with me, I'm still here, still recovering, and still trying to post.

Fat Cat

This is Skipper, who really should have been named Garfield. He's as lazy as Garfield and lives to eat. Here, he was laying on my bed and he rolled over, just like a dog, and had me rub his belly! Too funny.

These pictures don't really show his fat, but believe me he's REALLY fat. He had an extra belly pouch by the time he was 7 mths old.....I'm talking FAT.

Doesn't Max look so innocent....he's probably waiting till I turn my back to do something to the cat. He's so nasty to the animals that he's banned from touching anybody but Happy. We're not sure why, but either he's never nasty to him, or we just don't see him hurting Happy. We think it may be that he has a concept of Happy being able to really hurt him.....but we're not sure. I just keep praying that he's not growing up to be an axe-murderer.....I've never seen a kid so intent on torturing animals, especially at his age, he should have gotten past it by now.



And this is short and sweet, because we're in the middle of overhauling the house AND we got a Wii Fit today!! I've never gotten the house satisfactorily organized since we moved in and it's so bad that I HAVE to do it NOW, it's driving me crazy!!!

So if I'm not here tomorrow, I'm painting, moving things around AND taking the kids to the beach, fair or pool....we haven't' figured it out yet....

A Boy and his Toys

As I mentioned, Thursday we went shopping and each of the boys bought something they'd been saving their money up for. Most of them bought watches, Lee had a watch, just needed a battery.

To preface this story, I need to explain that when Max was at the library a few weeks ago he found a My Little Pony book. (Which we've gotten to read at least once a day, and sometimes more. He's mostly memorized it at this point) I'm sure you can see where this is headed...... I think I mentioned to him that I had My Little Ponies when I was a little girl. He got all excited and threw his hands out wide and said "I"m going to get them ALL!!" It's been awhile since I was in the "pink" aisle, as the boys call it, so I wasn't sure if MLPs were even still around, but that didn't deter him, he was going to get some.

Well, they are still around, or are around again....and he fell madly in love with a stuffed one. A very large stuffed one. As large as our little dog. He hugged it, petted it and talked lovingly to it. So there I was in the middle of the "pink" aisle with two kids who were VERY obviously boys, one of whom is petting this VERY pink pony and talking to it......... And there was another Mom there with three little girls, picking out a birthday present for somebody.

I pointed out to him that he wouldn't be able to take it anywhere, that for it's sake it would have to stay in his room, and wouldn't he rather have the regular, rubber MLPs, which he could buy FOUR of for the price of the stuffed one. And they could be taken anywhere he wanted......

He was convinced and proceded to pick four of them. Jayden tried to convince him that he should get a set with a house and stuff, but Max was very happy with his four ponies. (And can you imagine being that Mom and listening to this conversation!!! LOL!!!)

Then we met up with the rest of the gang in the watch area, where I got to talk Max out of a pink Barbie watch.......... Usually I'm able to swallow his pink obsession, even in public, but I'm afraid I shrank from explaining a pink Barbie watch to people.....I tried for a Dora the Explorer watch, but that was a not go. Then he found a pink and black watch, but the band wouldn't fit, then there was this pink and silver watch....but it didn't apeal to him, for some reason. He ended up with a very nice, DARK purple watch, no explaining needed!!! Thank goodness.

So here he is, sleeping with his four MLPs and Silverhoof, his pink pony Webkins. You can barely see her, tucked under his chin. Brent had to convince him that horses sleep standing up, cause he had them all laying on their sides in a row next to him, and he was pushed against the wall, they took up so much space!

And I have to admit that I breath a huge sigh of relief, when he finally falls asleep.

And interestingly enough, he didn't pick all pink ones. Even though I pointed out all of them. He's had a grand time with them. Now he's on the look out for MLP books because his library book has to be turned in soon! And if you're a Grandparent, looking for a Christmas gift......well there's still the large stuffed pink pony........

One last note, after a few times typing pink, when I went to type pick, I kept typing pink!!

A new bike

Thursday we had a nice evening as a family. It started with a 3:30pm appointment for Than with an allergist. He's been suffering from congestion since last fall and nothing we've tried has gotten on top of it, including multiple different allergy medicines and nasal sprays. So I dropped off Collin, Lee and Jayden at the library, that's about 5 mins. down the road from the Drs. office. Amanda stayed in the suburban with Max in the parking lot, Max was watching a movie and we thought he'd fall asleep! But instead, Amanda feel asleep......

The plan was for Brent to pick up Amanda and take her to the DMV, because she had misplaced her drivers permit several months ago, and it still hasn't surfaced. The DMV was open later on Thursday. He picked her and Max up and got her permit.

In the mean time, Than had a scratch allergy test for the usual environmental allergies and for milk, which were all negative. Then he got to do a breathing test, followed up by a chest x-ray. Everything came up as normal. So now he's on antibiotics for a possible long standing infection and on a different nasal spray. Plus he's rinsing his nasal passages once a day. He says the rinsing helps and I have a few friends who swear it helps, I can't quite make myself try it.......

We all came together afterwards at Pizza Hut. Three of the boys had qualified for the Pizza Hut personal pan pizza certificate at the library. The others didn't make the age criteria. Brent had gotten a gift certificate at work that day, for good performance, and so we had a free dinner!! It was so much fun. The older kids sat at one end playing word games and Brent and I had some time with Jayden and Max, with the older kids asking our help once in a while for answers.

From there we headed into Wal-mart, as several of the kids had been saving up their money for various things and I needed some groceries. Everyone got the items they wanted and we had a good time. Then we headed to Fleet Farm, to get rat poison, and so Than could look for a bike. He's been keeping an eye out for a few months and was very excited to find one that night!!

So here it is.....


He's very pleased with it..

We had a such a good time that night and I'm very pleased with our efforts to get in more family time together.

Family Time

One of the changes in my focus now that I'm recovering is to make sure we're putting family time up front and personal. So when we had unexpected time Wed. and Brent and I were figuring out what to do with it, I suggested he take the kids out and throw a ball or something with them. They love it when he does it and it's literally been a month or more since he's had just fun time with them.

So he went out and they decided to throw two frisbees around the circle that they made. So they would call someone's name and then throw them the frisbee. They had so much fun!!

Here is Than and Lee getting ready to launch their frisbees.

Lee throwing one to Than.

Collin and Than meeting in the middle. They would race to get a frisbee if it fell short of the person it was intended for.

A big launch by Lee.


Max throwing to Brent. He has a pretty good throw, he could get it across the circle at times.

Here is Jayden getting the frisbee.....

Winding up........

And it's OUTA there!!!

Two brothers having fun.

Nice throw Lee!

The orginal plan was that Brent would play with them for 30 mins., then we would work in our office for 30 mins, then we'd get ready for bed...... I went out at 30 mins to snap pictures and tell them that their time was up. But I noticed Amanda wasn't out with them. We sent Lee in to get her, as ALL of the kids were supposed to come out at least for a few minutes. Then I had to wait to tell them time was up, and before I knew it, both Amanda and I were sucked in!

Throwing the frisbee : 60 mins. Cleaning the office: 0 mins. Time well spent.

Brent and I had to laugh. Amanda said on her way back into the house that she hated it when that happened, we thought she meant, that we end up doing something fun, and because she's oblivous to anything around her, she misses out on it, or comes in late. But she meant that she hates it when she's not happy about doing something, like coming out to throw the frisbee, and then ends up really enjoying it and having fun!!

Maybe some day she'll learn that Brent and I really are cool parents........ha ha......

beans

Monday, the older kids were sent over to the cabin to pick the beans. Paige went with them. There they picked over 37 lbs of beans in a little over an hour, including a distraction courtesy of Happy.

If you have read my 10inthecabin blog you know that we have these ground hog things here that create huge holes in our pasture. You also know that the dogs have treed two of them in the past. Well this time I guess Happy was determined to take care of the situation by himself. While picking the beans the kids saw Happy running by the garden with a ground hog in his mouth!! He kept dropping it and picking it up. When the kids got to them, the ground hog was pretty injured, so the older boys shot it, to put it out of it's misery. Which Paige took exception to....poor Paige, she was staying with us to see what farm life was about......she got to see up close and personal!!

When they came home, we went swimming for the rest of the morning. In the afternoon while Max and I napped, the older kids got to work snapping beans......and snapping beans......and snapping beans..........and, well you get the picture. They also watched two movies while snapping.....they were at it for awhile.

They were still at when Max and I got up. Max jumped right in and helped, well at least that's what he was trying to do.......

Mostly he stood in the way of the TV and bothered Paige.......

After dinner Brent and I blanched them. Here is Brent pouring them into the pot.

Here is the sink set up. We poured the beans into the cold water in the bowl in the sink and after they were cooled put them on the cookie sheet with a towel on it.

Jayden was right there helping anywhere we could use him.

Paige using the vacuum sealer.

And the boys watching....

Collin writing the date on the bags. We did the sealing and writing in fits and starts....because there were so many helping hands, Brent couldn't keep beans in front of them. They would watch the Olympics and then they'd come in on commercials and pack whatever was on the table and mark them, then go back to watching TV until the next commercial.

Jayden and Max really didn't have much interest in the Olympics, the beans were waaaayyyy more interesting to them. I'm not sure why. We packed the beans in zip locks for the first bit, but them Brent pulled out the vacuum sealer and that worked really well, and we used it for the rest of the beans. WELL, that got Max and Jayden's attention!!! They were RIGHT there. I had to make bags, which you do by taking a roll of plastic that is essentially one long bag, with no seal on either end. Then you cut it to size and use the sealer to seal one end. Then you have a bag to put the beans in. Then you activate the vacuum part and it finishes off the bag by sucking out the air and sealing the bag.

It did not take long before they had taken over making the bags!!! BOTH of them..........



Oooohhhh my aching head!!!! Not really, Brent just caught me adjusting my bandanna! But working with those two at the end of a long day, really had me holding hard to my last nerve.

And tomorrow we get to do it all over again!

x-rays and swimming

I had my check-up yesterday and my lungs are clear. However I was told to expect to continue to cough for another three weeks and perhaps take as long as another three weeks to get back my stamina....such fun. I'm very, very grateful that my lungs are clear however and am looking forward to being out of bed more!! I've been cleared to do what I'd like, as long as I don't tire myself and it's recommended that I take a rest in the afternoon. So I guess my naps with Max will continue for awhile!

I've taken the kids swimming the last two days again, and this time I got some outdoor pool pictures.


Here is page, trying to get up the nerve to get back into the pool. They've been filling the pools this past week and they just use a hose and non heated tap water, so it's COLD in the water. She had been sunbathing with Than and Amanda, who you can see behind her, and wasn't real excited to acclimatize to the water again.

As I went to take this picture, Max walked by and I had visions of him dripping water on his brother! So I had to tell him to leave them alone.

I use the term sunbathing loosely as it has been mostly overcast with some sun this week. But it evidently was shining enough that their faces got too hot! Too funny for me to see them sunbathing.
Collin too had been sunbathing, but I missed him doing it. Here he is in the deep end, standing flat footed, well it's not quite the deep end, almost.
Here's a better picture of our newest swimmer!! He's such an eel. Tuesday he was diving for a penny and swimming underwater already!! He's so happy about being a swimmer and I think even prouder, because his brothers all told them that he's younger than they were when they learned to swim....which I'm not sure is strictly true, but if they want to boost his self-esteem, I'm all for it!! Because of the age differences, Jayden tends to get left out mostly, so I was very happy to let them heap praises on his head.
And poor Max...he was freezing and I couldn't be inside, the humidity was too much and I couldn't breath comfortably inside that day. Plus he can't sit in the hot tub and get warm, like his siblings, so here he is, telling me and showing me how cold he is......
Here is his solution. He was interested in seeing that his siblings were sunbathing, but by the time he got over there, the sun was behind the clouds, so instead he had me lay his towel over his entire body!
And Jayden thought that was a good idea also...........

They did warm up I promise, I didn't bring home any ice cubes!