A new venture

Today I begin posting over at Homemakers Who Work.  It's introduction time over there so stop in and meet all the other writers as well.  It should be a grand adventure.  We'll be dispensing words of wisdom (hahaha) when the introductions are finished.

The week in photos

I'm feeling a bit better now- having had my rant and cry.  We got a bunch of boxes packed and moved out this afternoon and the weather cooperated that I could get some weeding done in the garden.  

I'm a bit miffed.  My peas have all been eaten off down to the level of the weeds that they are surrounded by.  I was going to weed them but decided against it until I can get my fence up. I need to make that a priority.   I may not have any peas this year which will be a hard thing to cope with.  Everything else in the garden is looking fabulous.  We had our first salads from the garden tonight.  YUM!

Now on to the highlights of the week

The last day at Longfellow Elementary.

K and his kick ass bike.  

He and I did get down to the bike shop to pick out his bike.  He got a really great one.  It's a bit big for him- he got a small frame adult bike as opposed to a kid's bike- but he got a 7 speed mountain bike and he'll most likely grow into it by the end of the summer.  And what a great deal- he got a nearly $500 bike for free!  It doesn't get much better than that.

My fabulous kitchen!

Yeah, I know,  the island isn't finished yet but the track lights, range and hood all work!  The electric range will be going up on craigslist soon.

The peonies are in full bloom.

It turned out to be a pretty good day, considering the rough start.  We've almost got all the books packed up from the basement but I'm out of boxes.  ARGH!!! All I've got left are really big or really little boxes.  Nothing that is really useful.  (sigh)  Maybe I can ask at the grocery store tomorrow.

I hope everyone has a great rest of the weekend.

Reader beware

I'm in a bad mood.  Cranky, crabby and downright B*&^#Y.  No particular reason but feeling overwhelmed and unappreciated.  

1.  No one wanted to go to the concert with me last night and with the number of assaults we've had in our neighborhood recently I wasn't going to go by myself.

2.  It's raining and things I need to get done in the garden can't happen in the rain.  It seems like the weather and my schedule aren't playing nice together.

3.  J and V were both looking for their uniforms this morning before class.  Ok... that particular load of laundry didn't get done this week.  If you're so concerned about having a clean uniform do the flippin' laundry yourself.

4.  No one has been helping with the dishes or vacuuming or much of anything else- at least not voluntarily.  Every time I ask the kids to do something you would think I'm asking them for the moon.

5.  I feel like I'm packing up this house single handed.  I realize that V has been focused on the new house but really, is it too much to ask for other people to pick up a box and pack a few books.  It isn't that hard!

6.  I'm tired.  The dog woke me up at 615 this morning.  And just once, I would like to be the one to lounge in bed.  I'm really tired of always being the first one up.  Is it too much to ask that someone else let the dog out and bring in the paper and let me stay in bed for just a little longer.

7 through 100.  All the other little things that are pissing me off today.  It's just one of those days where everything is setting me off.  The dog threw up on the stairs and K thought it was funny. Yeah... it's one of those days.

Ok.  I just needed to vent a bit.  I already had a bit of a cry this morning.  Now back to packing... the house doesn't pack itself.

I'll try to post some pictures of K's new bike later.  It's a really SWEET bike.

Not much to say

It has been a busy few days at work.  I haven't been very productive around the house though.  I've just been weary.  I did manage to get the trim painted on the garage this evening.

We were hoping to go downtown this evening since it is the first night of the annual Arts Festival and there is a free concert. The Squirrel Nut Zippers are going to be playing downtown and they are loads of fun.  But they don't even start until 9 and we've got a busy day tomorrow.  So I think we're not going to go, even though it would be loads of fun.

I think that tomorrow morning I'm going to run to the farmer's market and then take K9 down to the bike shop to finally get his prize bike.  After lunch we'll head out to the new house and see what can be done.  I need to touch up the paint in the dining room out there and maybe we'll get to do a little drywalling done. That and we need to work on the finish on the basement floor.  It's supposed to rain but maybe it will hold off long enough to get a bit of gardening done.

Now, it's off to watch a video with the kids and get some sleep.  I actually don't have to get up in the morning.  Wow!

Sheetrock and babbling

The first half of our sheetrock needs will be delivered tomorrow, along with the foam insulation for the basement and the studs for framing.  Woo Hoo!  Now we can finish the upstairs bath and start framing in the basement. Guess what we'll be doing this weekend!  

I12's 6th grade graduation party was amusing.  They had custom t-shirts for the kids and each one got a sharpie to sign each other's shirts.  There was also the customary display of baby pictures for guessing who was who and they did a wonderful photo montage set to music of pictures of the kids and activities from school since they were in kindergarten.  And finally, they had cake.  Not just any cake, but one with each child's name on a piece so they got their own name from the cake, decorated in the school colors.

It was also a bit sad. I12 is my 'worrisome child'.  He has always had delays in language and social skills.  We took the leap and tried him on meds for his ADHD last year which has helped with his school work.  I'm not so worried about him academically though,  He's a bright kid, just inattentive (he is really ADD, without the H).  What worries me is the social skills part.  As all his classmates were running around, chatting and laughing and signing each other's shirts he stood there, not knowing what to do.  I do so worry about how he will fare in junior high.  He has very few friends his own age.  He does have a few friends from the after school program but they are all a couple years younger than he is.  We took him in for a full psych evaluation last fall, since I still think he falls somewhere on the autism spectrum but they didn't really tell us much.  Part of the problem with the eval is that he does really well with adults, especially one on one so he was a shining star in the clinic, his problem is that he can't relate to kids his own age.  We've tried to get him involved in activities to get him 'socialized' but haven't had much luck.  He doesn't like sports- he would much rather spend time with a book or video game (his dad and I are the same way) and has different interests from most kids his age.  He does like acting though, so I was going to look into some summer programs at our local rec center to see what I can find.  I do hope that when he gets to junior high in the fall that he will find a group of similar kids who "don't quite fit" the normal mode and make some new friends.  He's going to have several hundred new friends to choose from.  I'm also hoping that he'll do some growing up over the summer- I think a little maturity will help.

Although, when I think about it, both V and I were 'misfits' in our schools when we were growing up.  We both had few friends (and still have just a few close friends) but somehow managed to find each other.

How about all of you- did you feel like you were part of the 'in crowd' when you were young or were you one of the outsiders?

A bit distracted

Didn't get much work done today here.  Oh, I managed to get everyone fed and got laundry folded and put away. I've been a bit preoccupied this afternoon.  Hospital administration announced today that they are going to start layoffs soon.  They won't say how many of the 6,600 employees will be affected but they have indicated that it will involve all levels of staff and will affect even those employees who do direct patient care.  I don't see how they can start laying off the people who care for the patients who pay the bills.  Now, some management folks I can see on the chopping block.  A few months ago, when they started asking people for ideas on cost savings I was a bit irked when the announced the hiring of some bozo for an 'assistant administrative vice president of doodling' or something like that.  Oh, the upper level management took a voluntary 5% pay cut which sounds great until you realize that  one of their 5% is more than I make in an entire year.  OH, THE AGONY TO HAVE TO LIVE ON ONLY $30,000 A MONTH!

I'm not worried about my job, the cuts will be based on seniority and I've been there the longest of all of us except the woman who is going through phased retirement already.  Our newest and youngest OT is really worried though, she just found out that she is pregnant with their first child and is worried that she will lose her job.  Since her husband is a farmer, she carries all their health benefits as well as brings in the steady/reliable income.  We did our best to reassure her that everything will be fine.  We hope we've already done our part by giving up a new position that had been approved for our division.

Like I needed any more stress in my life right now.  (sigh)

Tomorrow night is I12's 6th grade 'graduation' party at school so that should lift my spirits.  The children's last day of school is Thursday then V can start them on house repair boot camp.

Should be interesting....

Independence Days- take 2: week 5

Ok. I'm tired.  I seem to be saying that a lot lately.  But I didn't sleep well last night.  We were up late helping J15 on a school project that was due today.  It was a report on her 'life and times'.  She was supposed to prepare a history of her life, with pictures, and correlate the stages/ages of her life with world and US events.  Unfortunately, she ended up redoing much of it.  She had been working on it at school for the past week and had lots of pictures and information on her file on the school server.  Sadly, the school server was down all weekend and she couldn't access any of the photos she had already scanned in.   So she had to re-scan photos from before we had a digital camera and pull information and images off the web to complete her project.  Then, of course, her printer decided to be uncooperative.  Finally, she just saved it as a PDF and V printed it from his computer this morning.  Thank goodness for a household network where we can share files between computers easily.  When we finally got her wrapped up, a thunderstorm came through, and then I was having weird dreams that involved painting and packing.  Hmmm, I wonder why that would be.

I guess the 16 hour days I've been putting in working on the house have taken their toll as well.  Both V and I are feeling physically a bit better this evening after having had a 'down' day today.  V was doing some writing today and I was at work.  We did get out to the house for an hour or so this afternoon after I got off work.  V cut some wire to length for some of the re-wiring that needs done in the house and I got to weed!!!!  Hurrah!!!  Who would think I would be so excited about weeding.  I did get the lettuce, beets and chard weeded, the potatoes hilled a bit and some of the peas weeded.

But on to my usual Monday business: the Independence Days Challenge.

1.  Plant something- 3 huge crowns of asparagus from my parents, my super secret tomatoes, a yellow cherry tomato from our backyard and 10 free flowering tree seedlings (they look like tiny sticks!)

2.  Harvest something- RADISHES!!! our first real harvest from the new garden!  I did snack on a few leaves of chard and a bit of lettuce while I weeded but they aren't quite big enough to harvest for salad yet.

3.  Preserve something- again, my standard reply of  'only my sanity'  But that was quite a feat this week.

4.  Reduce waste- Hmm, the usual but not much else.  We are still trying to repurpose as much as possible out at the house.  Oh, and I guess I keep snagging boxes out of the 'office trash' drop spots at the hospital to use for packing (I got 3 boxes today!).  That saves them from ending up in the garbage.  My brother dropped off lots of boxes for us again today.  We will save all the boxes for them since they are hoping to be moving soon as well.  Oh, and another thing.  I pulled out a bunch of boxes, an almost new mop, broom and a box of cleaning supplies from the dumpster across the alley- someone had dumped lots of their moving/clean up stuff- so I ended up with a bucket, most of a bottle of bleach, nearly full bottles of clorox clean-up and 409 spray, a scrub brush and a few other things.

5.  Prep and storage- Well, we are still working on the ultimate prep of getting our homestead up and running (well, livable comes first!)  Storage is NOT high on my priority right now.  We're trying to downsize our stores before we make the big move or at least not add anything new.  Although, I'll confess, I almost picked up some canning jars I saw last week but then I remembered that my Mom says she has a whole bunch that she isn't using anymore that I could have (after we move!)

6.  Community food systems- Not really.  I guess the sharing of the super secret tomatoes is a kind of building community, even if they weren't mine to give- I was a recipient.

7.  Eat the food- no problem there. We're trying to reduce the stores so we've been eating from stores as much as possible, although I'll confess that we stopped at the store on the way home to pick up some frozen french fries to have with our burgers for dinner tonight.  But tomorrow is cheese tortellini (from the freezer stores- purchased when it was on a good sale) and pesto frozen from last year's garden. We're almost out but I noticed that my basil is up so we'll have more this year.