As if feral socks weren't bad enough...

....I'm now finding animals in the laundry.

Yep, you read that right. Not only do I have feral socks, but I also now have random animals showing up in the laundry.

I have spent literally the entire day doing laundry. It's mostly been sheets and bedding, but I've managed to get a few loads of clothes going too. For once, the girls had the majority of their dirty stuff in their basket, so I grabbed it a bit ago and took it into the laundry room and started chucking dirty stuff into the washer.

Now, I don't look at the dirty laundry. Truth be told, I don't want to look at it. I throw enough into the washer to fill it up, I toss in the detergent, and I turn it on and go - I don't check their pockets, I don't turn stuff right side out, nothing - they are old enough to do that themselves. If something is shoved into a pocket and gets washed because they didn't take it out - not my problem. If their laundry doesn't get clean because it's all bunched up and inside out - not my problem.

Yes, I know, I should make them do it themselves. Don't even go there. I have my reasons, ok?

Anyway, when the washer was done running, I went in to toss the stuff into the dryer. I got partway through the load of wet stuff, and when I reached back into the washer...I felt....something.

Something fuzzy. And wet.

And when I looked into the washer to see what it was, I saw eyes.

The practical part of me knew that it wasn't something that could be alive (anymore) but it still made me jump just a little bit - yes, I just admitted that.

I mean, come on, how often do you look into your washer and see eyes looking back at you?

After the split second of initial whatthewhat? I realized what it was and peeled myself back off of the ceiling.

Stupid freakin' stuffed animal.

*sigh*

Oh well. He's clean. And for scaring the crap out of me, he's now taking a nice hot dizzying ride in the dryer, where he will hopefully be smothered by underwear and feral socks. And just to get even, I think he will be posed somewhere in the girls' room so that they are greeted by his little beady eyes when they walk in there the next time.

Probably won't scare them, but it's kind of fun to think about it. At least it is for me.

Christmas Day

So only having one kid for Christmas Day was a little odd. It was definitely quiet. We (Daniel and I) slept in a bit and then went to church. After church we went to some friends' house for dinner, and he got to open a few more gifts...and I brought a few more home for the other kids to open when they get back from their fathers' houses.

After that, we stopped at The Dude's house for a little bit and then came home. Had some leftovers for supper and just generally relaxed. My computer has been acting totally stupid all night so I've spent more time arguing with that than doing just about anything else.

However, the view from my computer chair wasn't all that impressive. I'm not sure how this house gets so trashed so fast, but this is what I could see...and I wasn't happy.

Then a little while later, I looked over and spotted a body...

So I put him to bed and got to work.

It was a good day.

Our Christmas

For the most part, we are done with Christmas. The kids got their stockings and presents today, we had a huge meal that The Dude and I cooked together, and his mother spent the afternoon with us.

Alex left early this evening and won't be back until Monday evening. I am taking the remaining 4 to church at 11:00pm tonight for the candlelight service, and then I'll take the older 3 to their father's house and it'll just be me and Daniel for the next 2 days (unless we get to see The Dude, of course).

So, after getting a serious lack of sleep from last night, and a very early wake-up by the kids, I am running on fumes. So I'm just going to give you a bunch of pictures of the day, starting with an extremely grumpy and not-happy-to-be-awake me. (Yes, we are mostly in the same clothes from last night. Cut us some slack. We were tired.)

After we ate and cleaned up the kitchen a bit, we sat down and watched a little bit of the Cowgirls/Eagles game - but The Dude's mother wasn't feeling well so he took her home and I watched the rest of the game...rather gleefully, I might add. Loved that final score. I did a little happy dance even - and he wasn't here to see it.

It'll probably be 1:00am or after by the time that I get to bed tonight, so I'm sucking down a pot of coffee now to try to last.....as much as I hate not having all of my kids tomorrow, I'm looking forward to relaxing. I've already decided that I'm not doing anything tomorrow. I will sit on my butt all day, unless it's to get something for Daniel. But there are enough leftovers in the fridge to feed a small country, so other than popping something in the microwave, I don't even think that there will be any cooking involved.

There was really so much more to this day than I can even go into right now - all good stuff, trust me. Just lots of thoughts going through my head and I'm still trying to process them...maybe one of these days I'll be able to sort things out and explain. Or not. ;)

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Santa (and a cop too)

Of course, if Santa had not procrastinated and had wrapped presents earlier this week, (s)he wouldn't be so tired.

But no, instead, all of the wrapping waited. And since our Christmas celebration is a day early, that just made getting everything ready a little bit more of a challenge.

The Dude came over this afternoon and hung out with us...and after we finally got the last kid in bed, we started wrapping. We finally got everything done around 1:00am, with the exception of one last gift that needed to be picked up and brought over here - so The Dude is working on that mission right now and should be back shortly.

I didn't go all out with gifts this year. They got things that they needed plus a few extras. We're having dinner here with The Dude and his mother, and we're going to just hang out and relax and watch movies and spend time together as a family. Alex will be leaving sometime in the evening to go to his father's house, and I'll probably take the older 3 to their father's house after the late church service. They're going to get a ton of presents elsewhere, and they just don't *need* a lot of toys and games and junk.

On a humorous note, The Dude was getting ready to head back over to his house to pick up the one last big gift and when he walked outside, a cop car had pulled up on the street behind his van and was just sitting there - no lights or anything. He walked over to start his van, and the officer got out of his car - turns out that he had watched some drunks pull into a nearby eating establishment and he was watching and waiting for them to leave. Sure enough, a few minutes later, he went tearing out of the neighborhood like a shot! Given the former uh, activities that happened in this house before we moved in, seeing cops out front tends to make me a little nervous.

And now, Santa has to go make the cinnamon rolls for breakfast. Yay Santa.

Is Christmas Break over yet?

This might have been the kids' first full day of Christmas Break - but wow. The kids did nothing but fight all. day. long. From the time they got up until the time that they went to bed, they were at it.

I was at my wits' end more than once, and may not have displayed the most patient parenting skills available, but there does come a time when I just can't deal with it anymore. There may have been a garbage bag rampage in the girls' room, the boys might have gotten sent to their room more than once, there may have been some toys taken away on a semi-permanent (or permanent in one case) basis, and there may have been a few temper tantrums on my part.

I'm not perfect. I don't even pretend to be.

But, in between the chaos, I had to take Sarah to get her eyes examined. Luckily, The Dude came to my rescue (again) and kept the other 4 kids at home and I just took her downtown to get it done.

We were only gone an hour, but it was a peaceful hour...and in that hour he managed to help/encourage Emily to take care of her mess in the girls' room as well as straighten up the kitchen for me - all the while keeping all 3 of the boys in line. After Sarah and I got home, he got her to take care of her mess in their room too. I don't know how he does it - but he's good at it.

I had to try on a funky pair just for the heck of it.

Sarah's new frames - it'll be about a week before she gets them.

So tomorrow's plans involve having The Dude here all day so that we can clean and start prepping food for our feast on Saturday...we can tag team with the kids to keep them occupied and hopefully prevent them from killing each other and/or burning down the house. At some point, I do have to wrap presents - I was going to do that tonight, but a lack of sleep last night and a lot of emotional stress today (not just the kids, but some other stuff too) are acting together to make this an early night.

If I have to, I'll sneak presents into the bathroom tomorrow during the day to wrap them while The Dude distracts the kids. I really should go out and get more stocking stuffers and a few more small things for the boys....but we'll see what happens in that department.

Right now, the futon is calling my name....

I'm doing it again...

So I hinted around on my facebook page this morning that I was up to something. On a mission, so to speak.

I did accomplish my mission, and that was to go to the YMCA in Wichita to register for the Frosty 5K Run that is being held on New Years Day.

I am officially registered, I have my official bib and my official t-shirt and my official complimentary pen. Since I have been lazy for the past few weeks, I need to officially get off of my butt and get out and do some walking/jogging in the next week to get ready for this.

I'm not really worried about breaking any records. I just want to finish it. I went back and looked at the times that I had for the two other 5Ks that I've done - I did the first one on April 24, 2010 with a time of 53:15 (give me a break - I was pushing a stroller too) and the second one was on April 30, 2011 with a time of 41:43. I would like to think that I could do this one in under 40 minutes, but we'll see what happens. The Dude is going with me to keep Alex and Daniel entertained while I run walk/jog, and then we'll have lunch there (chili!) and head home.

I also found out that the date for the half-marathon is April 29, 2012 - and you'd better believe that I'm doing that one again - and I will improve my time over the last one on that! Maybe one of these days, I'll take my bionic hip and do a full marathon!

I've been sort of compiling a list of local races - not sure how many I want to do, but I know that I want to continue working to get healthier and to get into better shape. Right now, I weigh less than I have since 2002 - and I have to tell you that it feels pretty darned good! I still have a few pounds to go to get to my ideal weight, but at the same time I'm not letting my physical appearance define me. I am happy with myself, and I'm not going to let a few extra pounds discourage me.

Besides, my "normal" jeans that I put on today were too big - how can I be discouraged with that?

The Dude, the Tooth Fairy, and a Redneck Santa

Sounds like a bad sitcom, doesn't it?

Just to make it interesting, let's throw in a Vomit Rocket and a ride on the Poop Train.

Yeah, it's been one of those days.

It started out well enough. The Dude came over and we went on our major grocery shopping trip to prepare for our Christmas Eve feast. Now, let me remind you, I *hate* to shop. Seriously - I hate it. It doesn't matter if I have a pocketful of cash and no time limit - I still hate it. Add the whole pre-holiday attitude of the other customers and idiotic cashiers, and I was about at my wit's end.

Like my hat?

I think he was trying to strike a pose...

Daniel got sick at school today - I'm beginning to think that he might have some kind of allergy issue because he's been doing this a little too often. But yeah, the kid was hit by both the Vomit Rocket and the Poop Train today - and then was fine for the rest of the afternoon and evening.

He likes my hat too.

Alex has been having an issue with his teeth. For some reason, he likes to keep his baby teeth until his permanent ones are in completely - then his baby teeth slowly start to wiggle loose. We've been working on getting this tooth out for a couple of days now, and I was finally able to yank it tonight.

My skin is still crawling. I hate doing that.

Pre-yanking

Success!!!

Getting it into the Tooth Fairy Pillow

Ready for bed...

Alex is in kindergarten. He's 5...almost 6. I still can't get used to the idea of him reading. He's growing up too fast, and he likes to remind me on a regular basis.

He got a little notebook from his teacher today for Christmas, and he was "writing" notes in it. At first, he was just scribbling so then I told him to go ahead and write something - just to see what he could do. He surprised me and did these totally on his own, with no help at all.

So now the boys are in bed, the house is quiet, and I'm looking forward to being able to sleep in tomorrow. The older 3 kids have one more day of school before Christmas break but they're with Ex1 tonight so I don't have to get up in the morning - which I tried to drill into Alex's head, but I'm sure he'll have me up at the buttcrack of dawn like he always does. Hopefully no one is sick tomorrow so that we can go to the girls' choir concert in the afternoon - we missed their band concert tonight since Daniel wasn't feeling well.

The next few days will be a little crazy, between having the kids home from school and getting things done around the house before Christmas and finishing my shopping and trying to get things wrapped - I need a few more days, but I usually work better under pressure. It'll all get done one way or another.

I might go insane in the meantime, but at least it'll be fun!