October 12, 2009

• It's Been a Long One!

  This day felt like it lasted forever.  I'm serious!!!

  Too bad I don't associate this with a 5-star restaurant steak dinner by candlelight experience or a day enjoying the conversation of company!

  Instead, I remember hours and hours spent at the kitchen table doing school work!  Planning three lessons is proving to be challenging for me.  Most of you probably already plan for three . . . or more, children and wonder what I'm talking about, here!  Gradually slowing down Annamarie and taking extra time with her (math AND spelling) and then finding the time to help Luci with her reading . . .  it's wearing.  Poor Marissa gets the used up ends of me and my patience.  Fortunately, she is pretty self-sufficient when it comes to learning.  She's muddling through cursive letters write now - Luci is doing beginning penmanship because her writing is illegible!  I also reintroduced history and science this morning.  Nothing like a challenge!

  =====================

  It's been a good couple of days for sorting through all of the fall/winter clothes.  I threw loads in the dryer with a cup of water (for moisture) and set the dryer for ten minutes on each load.  The clothes were all so toasty warm when they came out AND without wrinkles!  Some clothes were put back in the bins for another year (colors or styles that didn't look that great on the current child, as they had looked on a previous sister) but everyone is set for fall.  Annamarie will need a few tops to go with her skirts.  Fortunately, last year's dresses still fit her.

             
                             The girls and my things neatly packed away until next spring.

  I even ended up with 2 large bags, 2 small bags, and 2 plastic bins of clothes to give away or put back up into the attic for the time when someone else's child grows into our cast off clothes.
             
                                         That's the remainder of Sushi's bone on the carpet!!!  Yuck!
                                     At least she doesn't chew our shoes or the girls' stuffed animals!

  I feel like stuff is everywhere! 

  We have a path from the front door to the den with plastic bins or boxes on each side!
     View from the foyer.                                                          View from the dining room entrance.

  Isn't that horrible looking???!!!  I'm afraid to put the lids on any of the bins and carry them to the garage.  As sure as I do, I'll find a summer frock in someone's dirty clothes basket or pushed to the back of a dresser drawer!!!  I'm making sure NOT TO COMMIT before I seal the lid on anything!!!  I still need to go through their drawers and probably UNDER the beds!

  You can imagine the dirty and fuzzies unpacking all of the clothes has left on our carpeting.  The carpeting is pathetically thin, as it is.  NOW, it has "thingies" all over it.  I'll have the girls vacuum, once I've decided to seal the boxes and send them back to the attic!  Until then . . . you kinda get what you get, around here!

  ====================

  I made lamb chops Saturday night served with mint jelly.  I COULD TASTE THEM!!!!!  Granted, I only ate 2 small chops, but tasting those two was worth all the tea in China!  Last night, I made chicken breasts in the oven with a bit of barbecue sauce.  I could taste that, too.  It's just that I eat such SMALL portions compared to before.  I probably eat less than Luci.  The weight isn't coming off of me too terribly fast, so I'm not too concerned.  My clothes feel better and that's not a bad thing!

  ====================

  Jesse picked up half of the firewood he ordered *for cheap* this weekend.  The reason for the cheap price is that he has to take monster size logs and make them fit into our tiny fireplace.  He's been busy with the chain saw when the weather has stopped drizzling.  He has to pick up the other half of the wood at the end of the week.  Meanwhile, the fireplace is waiting for him to replace a bit of mortar that has cracked and one hole in the bottom corner to be filled.  It looks so sterile and pristine after the chimney sweep came (about a month ago) and it's crying for someone to light a fire!

  These days are so cold and damp and I miss the fireplace.

  See the tarp on the grass?  That is where the wood to be chopped is being stored.
       
        The black trash can outside the back door means . . .
               
        WOOD !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
      
                                            And, wood means FIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  Doesn't that look warm and cozy?  I can feel the warmth!  I see wood and think fire.

  Funny thing.  I look at the same picture in the summer and think termites!!!

  The girls are wrapped up warm and outside helping carry the newly chopped wood to its winter home - the corner of the yard.

  =========================

  Tonight's dinner will be Friday night's "fake steak" - ground sirloin patties broiled and served with A-1 steak sauce or barbecue sauce.  Too bad I didn't have the forethought to pull some stew meat from the freezer and simmer a beef stew all day.  It's one of those kind of days and not supposed to improve much this whole week.

  Late last night, I started a new book.  Imagine my delight when I pulled from my bookshelf a FOURTH book (a sequel) to the books I had been reading.  I hated to say good-bye to the characters and now I don't have to.  Jesse thought I was ridiculous, I'm sure, for being so excited!  It's taken me a long time to read the series, but I've enjoyed the stories immensely.  I'm learning a lot about Nova Scotia.

  ==========================

  Brrr, I'm chilled sitting here.  It feels like fall.  I have no where I have to go until the girls' appointment on Friday and life is rocking along.  Can't wait for that lit fire in the fireplace!!!

  Be Blessed  ~

  • 6:52 pm
  • 6 Comments