News Bullets

-Zach's chicken pox was mild (from start to finish 5 days) and he is back in school.

-No one else is showing symptoms.

-I have an idea for starting a workshop. Thanks for your suggestions.

-Our lilac trees are starting to bloom. I love this time of year...it smells so good around our house.

-We have blueprints for our addition. Hopefully they will be getting started SOON. The waiting is driving me bonkers.

The One Where I Feel a Little Bit Sorry for Myself

So, remember how I became a consultant for Creative Memories? Well, if you missed it, I did. I booked a get together from my first e-mail and I was so excited about it. I spent all kinds of time getting ready and learning stuff. It occupied my time and it felt good to be working toward something. It was supposed to be this past Saturday. Unfortunately the host got sick and had to postpone. It's totally not her fault and I'm glad to not be sick right now because of it, but it was a big let down. No one else has told me they want to host a get together and I don't want to pressure anyone. I feel bad guilting or pressuring people into doing things for me. So now I'm stuck. I feel so deflated to have nothing to show for all the work I've done and I don't know where to go from here. Maybe people would host an event they just need a personal invitation, but is that putting people on the spot? I've heard way too many people complain about how "so and so" keeps bugging me to have a "such and such" party or "such and such" only talks to me to sell me stuff. Ugh, I don't know what to do and I feel like a total failure. I chose Creative Memories because I know it will sell itself. After years of working in craft stores and crafting on my own I can tell you it is definitely the best stuff out there. I was actually surprised at the difference when I first started using only CM stuff (which was a couple weeks ago when I got my kit, but I didn't tell you that.) I know I just need to be able to present it to people. I love scrap booking and I thought this would be so fun. Well...it is fun when I am getting ready for stuff or doing something, but it's totally not fun to feel like a failure.
Any advice?

::a shake of the head and a slight eye roll:: He is His Father's Son

After I put Lily down for her nap today I went down to switch some laundry. I passed Ryan playing with a wind up motorcycle toy on my way to the basement. Usually he likes to help me, but this time he declined the invitation. I went on my way, switched the loads of laundry and came upstairs with the clean clothes to fold. What should greet me upon my return? Why it's Ryan with a screw driver in hand and an almost disassembled motorcycle toy in front of him. When I asked what he was doing he simply said, "The motor is broken. I need to fix it." I don't know where he got the screw driver, but he can undo every child lock in the house, so it's no wonder he can get to stuff. I put the toy back together and there was no problem with the motor. He just didn't know how it worked. ::still shaking my head over that one:: I showed him how it worked and he played with it for like 2 minutes and went on to the next thing.

The Pox

So, Zach has chicken pox.
What's that? Did you say chicken pox?
Why yes I did.
Don't they immunize against that?
Yes, yes they do.
Didn't Zach get the immunization?
Let me check...YES.
Then why does he have the chicken pox?
Good question!

Happy Birthday TJ!

Happy birthday to my "little" brother, one of the coolest, funniest people I know. Be safe. We love you!


***There is a new post below, but I think TJ deserves to be first the whole day:-)***

Room idea

So I've been working on noew ideas for the entry room and this is one I came up with today. It has a good sized closet for the kids' toys and houses the desk with some shelves for books and papers. There are a few versions of this dancing around in my head. In one the closet and the chairs are switched and in the other the closet and the desk are switched. I have not done the plans for those yet, but I will if Jay has any kind of good reaction to this or those ideas. No use doing work that is in vain.
This first picture is the 3D rendering of the room I designed. If you look on the right hand side near the top there is a plan drawing with a camera picture to help you get your bearings.



This one is the plan that goes with that rendering.

I don't feel any different...

I hit the big 3-0 today. It still seems a little unreal that I am now in my 30s. Good-bye 20s. I've just resently stopped feeling like I am college age. Have you heard 30 is the new 24 and 50 is the new 30? Well, I have and I'm liking it:-)

And the Teasing Begins...

Not Ryan or Zach, no they practically have Masters Degrees in teasing. Lily has started. Yesterday she went up stairs and got Ryan's special blankie. She brought it to the top of the stairs, draped it over the edge, waited for Ryan to see and then she ran. She ran as soon as he saw it. He didn't even have a chance to yell or anything. That's how I know she did it on purpose. Can you believe that little peanut?! I guess she has quite a bit of her daddy in her.

Ryan on Jeopardy **edited**

It was so weird to see someone I know on TV. Sorry you got deluged with chick categories Ryan, you're still a super smarty to me:-) I saw you pushing your buzzer a lot more than you got credit for...maybe it was broken;-)

Don't forget to watch Ryan on Jeopardy tomorrow night! No, not my son Ryan, silly. My friend from high school, Ryan H. He's such a smarty;I'd probably have trouble getting on "Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader?" and he's all up on Jeopardy. I can't wait to find out how he does.

What does that say?

That time stamp! What does that say?! Oh yes, it's 5:20. Lily has been awake since about 4. Good times.


Stupid ear infection!

She Said What?!

I'm beginning to think I'm the worst mom. Lily goes through her day babbling and making gestures. Sometimes she really seems like she is trying to say something, but I usually don't know what it is. A couple weeks ago we were at Chuck E Cheese and Lily wouldn't sit at the top of the slide. I kept telling her "You have to sit down", helping her to her bottom and then helping her down the slide. Another mom heard her "si" sound and exclaimed, "She just said sit!" Maybe she was saying sit, but she makes sounds like that all the time, so I didn't even notice. I just passed it off as one of those things. You know, people hearing what they want to hear. Today when we were at the doctor's office Lily said some babbly type thing along the lines of "Ah he dat." and the doctor said, "You hear that, huh?" Again I am taken by total surprise that someone would associate words with what is coming out of Lily's mouth. My mom realized that Lily has started waving and saying, "Da da-i" for goodbye. When she puts it together with the sign I can recognize it and I realized today that she was saying bye-bye when I couldn't see her, so maybe I'm learning, but I feel like a bit of a mommy dunce. Don't they say that moms are supposed to be he only ones that understand babies for a while? Maybe I was spoiled because Ryan's language was so clear so fast. I sure hope Lily starts getting clearer or I start getting smarter!
I did figure out that one of Lily's gestures means "Come get me." She does it when she is finished eating and some other times. I figured it out today when I made a similar motion to her and said "Come here." She made her motion back at me with a sly grin on her face. She wanted me to chase her, the little pickle! Maybe we'll figure each other out yet.

Room Arrangements

I've been spending a lot of time using Floor Plan 3D to figure out what to do with our existing room and the addition downstairs. It's really hard because the existing room is long and narrow. If we put up walls in the existing room it will cut off the family room from the rest of the house. I'm not sure that is a bad idea, but it seems like it might not work out so well. Any thoughts? Does anyone out there have ideas for arranging a very long narrow room that would be open to a larger family room? The long narrow room is the first one you see when you walk in through the front door. I can't seem to come up with something that Jay and I both like.

Here are some pictures of the Floor Plan stuff I've been doing.

The room we currently have on our first floor.

The room with the addition plain.

Office closet idea.

Closet only idea.

Happy Easter

Almost 2 Weeks- In Bullets

-Ben's party was fun.
-I need to get another extra battery (since my old one is useless) so I don't end up carrying a 3 pound brick around all day.
-It's spring! Woohoo
-It's April! Double WooHoo!
-Lily is saying some things that resemble words now. Today I swear she said "brother" for Ryan.
-Ryan has been really excited to have "Jacknjees" for breakfast this week. To the rest of us that is a sausage, egg and cheese biscuit. I'll say it slowly for him and he repeats it, but then calls it "jack 'n' jees" again. It took me a few minutes to figure out what he meant when he was dancing around the kitchen singing, "Yay, jacknjees!" over and over when I got home from the grocery store.
-Ryan is "playing" the piano and singing right now and it is so cute.
-Lily had her first gymnastics class. She had a lot of fun, but I felt a bit aimless with little direction as to what to do with her. Mostly she just climbed around the equipment.
-I became a Creative Memories consultant. I'm excited, nervous, happy and unsure about it all at the same time. Does this make me a work at home mom? Hmm. I guess I'd rather think of myself as a stay at home mom with a little side stuff going on. At least I'll never have to get a babysitter since I can plan events for when Jay will be home and do all the other stuff at nap time.
-We decided to put an addition on our house. The contractor has already been here twice. This too is exciting, but a little scary. I have all sorts of plans for the addition rolling around in my head.
-Our whole family is sick...even Jay. It's just a cold, but it is still really annoying. It is especially annoying because it seems to be the reason Lily has been up half the night crying for the past 3 nights. No, we don't leave her to cry on her own, but she is often inconsolable. This means that at least one of the adults is severely sleep deprived the whole day. Usually both of us. This does not make me look forward to a whole day of holiday celebration. I really hope everyone is better by Sunday and we all manage to get a decent night's sleep before then.
-I am so taking a nap when Lily does today.
-I let Jay guess what his birthday present would be because I didn't think he would guess in a million years. He did. On the first try. So much for surprise. He seems to like it though, so I guess that makes it okay.