Monday, March 24, 2008

Lingering On...

Is the flu that never ends. I try to post at least once a week. That way people still check it and I'm not obsessed with it. And it keeps it somewhat interesting. I don't have to write every day and say, "hey, guess what? I did nothing today." But I came down with a wonderful case of the flu over a week ago and I'm still feeling it. I'm pretty sure I got it from Halle who's been puny off and on for two weeks. Maybe it's not the flu but it's some crazy virus that lasts for-e-ver. Chloe actually has struggled with something for all of Spring Break so last week- the week I've been looking forward to forever so I could do some fun stuff with my kids- turned into a sleep and watch TV on the couch-a-thon. I felt really bad about it and then decided that it's not my fault and there's absolutely nothing I can do about it and moved on. Well, I haven't moved that much...anyway.

But there were a few things I did that were right. The first is that I spent Sunday (a week ago) cleaning. I was very motivated to get the house entirely clean so that we could start the week off fresh. And somehow we were able to keep it that way for the whole week. So that when my parents got here on Friday we didn't have to spend the whole day cleaning like mad and I was able to do some stuff that I don't usually get to. Like cleaning the microwave and the front of the stove and fridge where stuff drips but doesn't get noticed until *after* people have left your house. I was very proactive about Easter basket stuff and went out on Wednesday so that I wouldn't be elbow to elbow with the mobs on Saturday. That is actually something I wish I'd waited on. It's not a good idea for someone who mostly lives without sugar to have candy in the house for four whole days before the holiday. That being said I had to replace two of the bags of candy on Saturday (no, I didn't eat them by myself but I did eat too much). And when we went out on Saturday to the Galleria, Sam's Club and Target the only place that was remotely crowded was Sam's Club. The streets were nearly deserted. Weird. But back to my parents visit...

They got here Friday evening and I decided that I would not do a ton of stuff, no running errands, before they got here in the hopes that I would be able to do a bunch of stuff when they got here. Saturday night Amanda made plans with them to go to Panera for breakfast and then drag, er-um, go to the mall with them. Travis and I originally opted out because we weren't feeling well but I was awake by 7:00 Saturday morning and had that overwhelming "there's fun to be had and I'm going to miss it" feeling, so I got up and got ready and got the girls ready. I accidentally woke Travis up and he couldn't go back to sleep because he had the same feeling so he came too. Breakfast was really nice, the mall wasn't crowded, I finally got some more Sonny's BBQ sauce (it's only carried at Sam's Club and we have a Costco card), had a great lunch at Blue Coast Burrito, and then to Target. Where my Mom spoiled the little girls with new Easter dresses and shoes and some things for their Easter baskets. Then we headed home- whew- to take a short nap.

After I got up, I decided to make cinnamon rolls, since my Mom brought her bread machine, and the Easter Bunny cake I made last year. Only this year I made it using this recipe and cream cheese frosting. I used a cake mix in the past but this recipe is more dense and suitable for sitting on it's side. I really like it.

The next morning we all got ready for church and mom threw together some wheat bread that we could eat with lunch (you can throw bread together if you have a bread machine and it takes about 5 minutes- God bless whoever invented that!) and I tossed a couple of pork roasts into the crock pot so that we could have pulled pork BBQ for lunch- mmmm. It's not traditional but we liked it. And mom left the bread machine so that I can make bread whenever I want to. She let me borrow it before but I really thought it was going to be hard to use so I never tried it but I have to say that I don't think I'll *ever* try to make bread without it again. One reason is because even though my little hand mixer has bread hooks, it just doesn't have the muscle to do what needs to be done. And speaking of kneading, I'm just not going to do it by hand. It's not enjoyable and it takes too long. The girls especially love it and Chloe wants me to make bread for her lunches from now on.

Overall, we had a great time with my parents (we always do) and were sad to see them go. Dad says it's too cold for them to move here plus they have to be where God wants them- blah, blah, blah- I'm so totally kidding. I want them to be where God wants them to be, it would just be nice to have *some* family here. But I won't get started on that again.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

I Found It!

I finally found the fabric I was lookin for at the quilting shop in downtown Franklin. I picked up some at JoAnn but it wasn't what I had envisioned. And it was pink and orange and not at all the shabby chic style that Angie is going for. This won't be a perfect match but hopefully it will go with the "spirit" of the room. The quilting store was great. I've never been in one before but they had tons of fabric in every imaginable pattern. They definitely had a better selection for what I wanted. I'd show you a pic of what I picked up originally but my camera is completely dead and it took way too long for me to figure how to post a pic using Amanda's camera and software, etc. but lets just say I won't be keeping it. Looking at it now I'm wondering what I was thinking since I don't even like it.

Halle has battled the flu and won this week. She had a high fever for 3 days and so I took her to the Dr. because that is very unusual for her. But the Dr. said it was the flu and that she was on the other side of it and that there was nothing they could do about it. Which was fine with me because I don't want her to be on antibiotics anyway. It's actually been almost a year since the whole tragic mouth incident when she was on antibiotics. She also has quite the scar on the roof of her mouth. I didn't realize that you could have a scar there. But she's much better health wise and I'm happy because she.was.miserable.

And I got a haircut this week! At a super-awesome salon no less. When I lived in Hendersonville the property manager of the apartment complex that I worked at recommended that I go to Fantastic Sam's because a girl that worked there used to do hair at a department store. It's the one that was Proffit's then Hecht's then Macy's- whatever store it was before Proffits which was before my time. Anyway, I've gone there ever since but since we moved to AL and came back I started letting another girl cut my hair. She's nice and my hair always looks fine but there are always spots that she misses. Plus I was tired of driving an hour and a half round trip to get my hair done- and gas being over $3 a gallon sort of pushed me over the edge. I was hesitant to call them because I got my hair done at Micheline's in Lakeland a couple of times and they were super snooty. When I moved back to Lakeland from PC I called them because just before our wedding I decided to highlight my hair with a cap and hook and ended up bleaching a quarter size spot in the middle of my head. So I called and said I needed to have my hair colored, blah, blah, blah and the not so nice guy on the other end said that they'd have to look at my hair and then decide if they'd color it or not. Seriously? So it was a huge relief when I called and they were really nice. I even asked for an internist (cheaper haircut) and she was excited and said they had an appointment available in 20 minutes. It was totally my lucky day- blessed day, whatever, I was happy. Then I colored and highlighted it (with some help from Amanda) and it looks pretty good. I'm looking forward to the day when I can afford to have someone else color my hair. It is such a chore and I hate it. Amanda had her hair done the same day by a guy that had cut her hair when she went to get it done for free during the apprentice class that they have. He had to cut quite a bit off because a lot of it was breaking from all of the bleaching she's done to it. All in all I think we're both pretty happy.

And that's a wrap.
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Monday, March 10, 2008

So Cute!

This is so seriously, amazingly cute. It makes me want a pet cupcake.

Friday, March 07, 2008

It's Girls Day!!!

Well, I guess every day is girls day at the Button casa but today is *really* girls day because Travis isn't coming home tonight. He's felt for a little while that God wanted him to go away and pray so tonight he's headed to a lodge south of here. Of course, we're supposed to have rain, sleet and 3-6 inches of snow (we'll see) but we both agree that we're not going to let fear dictate what God is going to do. And since everything is an occasion for me, I have a mental list of 80 things I want to do tonight. I bought a Barbie movie for the girls that they're watching now and I have a few minutes to blog-yay!

It's not like I don't have time to blog, I'm just trying to direct my time and energy so that I'm more productive. I've been thinking about it for a while and see that since I mostly blog about the good, productive, happy things I do, people that don't know me well probably have a much different view of me than is real. To say that I'm not perfect is, well, um, *duh*. But there are specific things in which I consistently fail. For instance, picking my clothes up out of the bathroom floor. I don't even necessarily mean to do it *and* it drives me crazy about myself but I can't seem to get past it. I'm a terrible housekeeper, no really, I stink at it. I'm not organized and I'm constantly wondering where my time goes. I don't finish projects. I start strong and then fizzle out, usually because I get interrupted or because of a roadblock. Sooo, where to go from here? I have to go somewhere because I *need* order in my life. My kids need to do chores. I'm constantly picking up after them only to have them destroy it in about 2 minutes. It takes focus on my part that I don't have. I've never developed it but I know I can. So four out of the five days this week I wrote down a list of things that I wanted to get done during the day. Wednesday it helped that my mentor came over so even though I felt like "poo" I cleaned the entire house. I put up the last of the Christmas decorations (it was one of those roadblock things that I'd put off) and brought out pictures that I haven't had out since we moved here. Originally I didn't have anywhere to put them but then we were loaned the piano and I have space to put some of them. I did every single thing on my list that day but didn't finish my list for the rest of them. But I'm not beating myself up because I can't help it if I'm interrupted or not feeling well, etc. I'm going to have a plan but not beat myself up if I can't finish it. And I'm also going to schedule time with my kids and time for myself. If I spend hours doing things around the house I deserve some time to unwind and I refuse to feel guilty about it. The whole point is order and balance- not to go crazy in the other direction.

So tonight I want to plant some basil and Italian parsley in little pots- I'm not planting all of those seeds though because I don't need 50 of each plant so if anybody wants some just let me know. I haven't had the gardening bug yet this year and it concerned me a bit but I really want to start planting things now. I'm still not at the point that I can rent a tiller and do an entire garden but I really do like container gardening. You don't have to worry about weeds and things like that. I found some really nice sized galvanized buckets/planter thingy's at Lowe's for about $15. It was in the paint section I think so I don't know what they're actually supposed to be for but they look like perfect planters- with some drainage holes knocked in them of course. I wanted to pick up some oriental poppies tonight (beautiful and they'd make great models for paintings) but I read on the package that they bloom *one year* after planting. I think that I'm a pretty good sport about waiting for things to bloom since I plant from seed most of the time but I'm not that good of a sport.

And in a little note about my sweet little Chloe...

Isn't it wonderful when your kids do something completely out of the ordinary and your close friends are there to witness it? Or not. Last night we met the Kelso's at Chick-Fil-A for dinner. Well, the grown ups were all talking and the kids were in the play area (brilliant, no?) when I saw Chloe looking at a little boy with a really big scowl. Then I saw her turn around and start *punching* another little boy and then the first little boy and then the second little boy and then the first little boy and she were punching each other! I said, "Travis, she's punching them!". So he went inside and did the Dad, "hey, what's going on!?!" thing and Chloe started talking and crying and the boys scattered. Apparently, the boys were being mean to her and saying that they were going to pull her hair, etc. And as Kris put it, "she decided her best defense was a good offense". So my sweet little Chloe that *everybody* always loves, decided to take on two boys at once. I didn't know she had it in her but I definitely saw myself in that play area. Of course, Travis told her to come to us next time and he stayed in the play area for the rest of the night. Is it bad to say I was impressed though? No, I'm never going to tell her it's OK to beat people up...

It was really nice to see the Kelso's too. Those boys are completely adorable.

I recently purchased some fabric for my new nieces fabric cubes. Angie's going with pink and green but JoAnn's didn't have a decent green in the squares I was buying. So I want to go to the quilting store in downtown Franklin but I've either been feeling crummy or the weather has not been conducive to walking outside. Tomorrow is probably out because of snow but I'm getting there next week- I'll have to put it on my to do list. I'm just hoping that have better/cuter fabric than what I find at JoAnn's.

The girls movie is over so it's time to get crackin' on planting and whatever else I plan to do tonight. I should probably start by feeding them dinner...