So we got a few things done today....

Every now and then, we have one of those days when we just don't stop moving and we get tons of stuff done. I'm sitting here trying to think about everything that we did...

I started out by getting up and making the kids pancakes for breakfast. They all ate and got ready to go and then we took off and picked The Dude up at his house, then I took the older kids to Ex1's house and The Dude (and Alex and Daniel) and I went and met with the realtor to look at a couple more houses. They both had potential, but were a bit smaller than what we really need. However, like the other ones, we haven't ruled them out yet.

Then we came back to town and went back to his house and parked the van and then walked back a couple of blocks to a local store that was having a sidewalk sale.

I threatened to buy a big goofy hat to wear while fishing...

But instead we opted for lunch from the hot dog truck that was there. Two naked dogs for the boys, a bacon-wrapped dog for me, and a fully loaded Mexi-dog for The Dude.

In typical Dude fashion, he had to pose with Sr. Weiner.

After that, we went back to his house again, and we loaded up a bunch of stuff that needed to be donated elsewhere. We took a bunch of books to a local used bookstore, and a bunch of clothes and other stuff to the local thrift store. Then we stopped at one of the city offices to get our landfill coupons for the next project.

Back at his house again, we started on the yard. It had gotten pretty overgrown along the fence and was making it difficult to mow, so I cut all of the branches down and we loaded them into his truck and took off for the landfill to get rid of them.

After we got done at the landfill, we went back to his house and I got the yard mowed - so much easier without having to battle branches the entire time! Then I gathered up the boys and we ran into my work to get my schedule for next week and to grab something to eat before we took off toward our house. Once we got home, we inhaled our food and then I mowed my yard and Nice Neighbor's yard. After I got done with that, we ran to the grocery store to get laundry detergent and then BACK to my work to get the milkshakes that we had forgotten to get with our food earlier. Then it was back home again and baths for all 3 of us.

After doing all of that yard work in 99-degree heat, a shower was mandatory for me.

And now that we got all of that done today, I can lay around all day tomorrow and do absolutely nothing - and not feel guilty about it at all.

And that is my plan.

At a loss.

I just don't know that I can say much more than I already said.

I don't know what else to say. This one ...... this one is bothering me more than some of the other recent tragedies for some reason. Maybe because I have 2 races scheduled in the next 3 weeks. Maybe because a little boy the same age as Jared was killed. Maybe because part of Daniel's biological family lives in the Boston area.

We all deal with tragedy in different ways. Some of us sit, glued to the television or the computer, waiting for every report, every picture, every video. Some of us ignore it. Some of us pray, or cry, or scream, or laugh. Some of us post inspirational sayings or memes, or change our profile pictures, or join online movements or groups to show our support to the victims.

I don't know what I'm doing yet. I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. I do know that when I have a few moments tomorrow I'm going to run a huge bag of clothes to a local charity that gives them away for free so that others can get some use out of them. And I'm going to wear a t-shirt from one of the races that I've done in the past. Neither one of these motions will change anything - nothing can change what happened. Nothing can bring back the lives that were lost today. Maybe donating those clothes will make someone else's life easier. Wearing a race t-shirt shows my support for the running community as we all try to understand what happened today.

We can't all be there on the scene to physically help, and we can't all afford to send donations. But we can all do something on a local level, no matter how small - and that something has the potential to have a positive impact on someone else's life.

Something horrible happened today - but we can make positive things come out of it.

Do you really want me to look like an idiot? Here's your chance.

This post was written by my niece Ashley.

OK, OK, technically she's not MY niece. She's Ex1's niece. So she's really my ex-niece. Or something like that. But you know, that's just semantics in the grand scheme of things. 

Listen to what she has to say. It's important.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Cystic Fibrosis is a life-threatening genetic disease. There is no cure. You cannot catch it. You are either born with it, or not. However, just being around someone with it or their cough, will NOT, I repeat, WILL NOT make you sick. CF causes mucus to build up and clog some of the organs in the body, most commonly the lungs and pancreas. Mucus building up and clogging the lungs cause difficulty breathing, and frequent infections since the thickened mucus is bacteria’s favorite place to take up house. This eventually leads to lung damage. Many patients with CF are diagnosed as Pancreatic Insufficient, and require replacement enzymes to digest their food, maintain a healthy weight, and receive appropriate nutrition. Statistics from the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation indicate that approximately 30,000 adults and children are currently diagnosed with the disease, and that approximately 10 million more people are carriers! That breaks down to 1 in 31 Americans.

Let me introduce to you how that plays into our lives. In 2005, I met my husband. In 2007 we found out that we were expecting. Things began rocky. I had what I believe to be the worst case of morning sickness known to man. If I was awake, I was nauseated. Exercising, eating, drinking, asleep…you guessed it. When we finally got to the point to where we could find out what the sex of the baby was, the excitement was tantamount to Christmas morning to a four year old. We hear, “you see that? Looks like a turtle? That’s the penis.” It’s a boy. Much to my surprise, my husband’s face dropped. However, by the time we got home that day he was excited. “I’m going to get to teach someone to wrench on things like I do. He’ll tear his bike apart and put it back together.” There was the excitement I’d dreamed of.

Fast forward four weeks, to our next appointment. “The sonogram showed some fluid retention in the kidneys, which isn’t necessarily normal, but it’s not abnormal either. We’d like to do a second sonogram.” Okay, cool. We’ll get to see his chubby little cheeks and cute button nose again. Next sonogram the normal “drink until you think if you even inhale you’ll pee your pants” happens. They take a bunch of measurements, tell you what they’re looking at, we get a couple pictures, done.  The first appointment I attended alone, the OB was out of town.  Let me tell you, there are few things I thought would ever worry me. I never imagined that I would be 25-26 weeks pregnant and terrified. I see the PA and she says, “There were still bright spots on the bowel.” I’m sorry, what?!  This is the first I’ve heard of this. “Well, there are a few things it could be. It could be nothing, or there is a 1% possibility it’s Cystic Fibrosis.” They were going to play vampire that day anyway, so I told them to test it. Now, what they were looking for is whether I was a carrier or not. I was told 7 days for labs to come back and no news is good news. The 7th day I’m thinking, whew, we really cut that one close. At 5:15pm my phone rings. “You ARE a carrier for Cystic Fibrosis.” Crap. Now we’d have to get my husband tested, but insurance refused to pay for it, and we were too broke to pay out of pocket. We had no choice, but to hope and pray.

On October 12, 2007, Corban made a sweeping appearance in the middle of the night. Nothing like what labor was with my daughter. This was easy. He was 7lbs in all of his beautiful glory. He had passed meconium in utero, so we thought we were out of the woods. He nursed like a pro, except he seemed to always be hungry. He nursed 45 minutes, every 45 minutes. At 10 days, he developed a cough. It took some pushing, but I finally got them to test him. He was given a sweat test that afternoon. Now, typically they say they can’t get a newborn to sweat enough for good results. I reckon he didn’t need much sweat, because he was given a “suggestive positive” two days later. The phone call came while I was gone. I was eating lunch with my mother, and she had a phone call in the office. When she came back out she said “you need to go home right now. That was Matthew.” I knew. I hit the ground. All I could say was No repeatedly.  Suggestive positive meant he could still not have it. The only problem, his number was 112 mmol/L. Suggestive positive would mean he was below 60. At 60, it’s a diagnosis.

Digital Clubbing. Rounded fingers and wide fingertips.

We were referred to a specialist two weeks later. They did genetic work, and they found two genes. Official diagnosis.  Delta F 508, a very common mutation and Delta I 507, more rare. He was diagnosed as Pancreatic Insufficient in the office. He went on Creon (enzyme replacement) at that point, and will be on it for the rest of his life. Today, he is going on 6 years old. He has had pneumonia twice, tonsillectomy, adenoidectomy, polypectomy, diagnosed with Distal Intestinal Obstructive Syndrome (DIOS), at one point required a PICC line, and he has digital clubbing.

Vesting

How does this affect our family? Treatments are a big deal in our lives. Corban takes 3 breathing treatments once a day, and two twice a day. During those treatments he uses a vest, which is a machine that basically shakes him and breaks up the mucus in his lungs. 28 pills on average per day, and a nasty nasal rinse twice a day. Every 3 months, we take a road trip 200 miles north to see the Pulmonologist, Dietitian, Social Worker, Gastroenterologist, and Respiratory Therapist. Despite all of this, he is your typical boy.

This is the machine that tests his FEV1 -Forced Expulsion Value based on 1%.
In other words...how much of the air in his lungs can he get out. 
It tells what level his lungs are functioning at.
He has been as low as 70% - today he was at 98%!

Trip home. He puts out that much effort
on the machine.

Corban's daily medication

Corban will live the rest of his life battling CF. I pray strongly each day that he will beat it. His odds are good. But it’s a downhill disease. Right now, the average life expectancy for a CFer is 37.

Here’s where you come in. Each year Great Strides puts on walks all over America. Our Local walk is May 4. This is our chance to raise money to fund the research for the cure, as the Foundation runs solely on donation. Nearly 90 cents of every dollar raised goes directly to research.

Just visit this page to donate in my name...... or.......

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Here's where it gets fun. Ashley and I are both very competitive people. And we are evil. And we can really really torture each other.

So we have a little challenge going between us. You can either go her page to donate to her, or you can go to my page to donate to me. All of the money goes to the same place in the end.

Out of the two of us, whoever gets the most money donated gets to 'dress' the other person the morning of the walk. If I raise more money than she does, I get to make her wear whatever I want her to wear - clothes, hairstyle, shoes, makeup, accessories - you name it.

But, if she raises more money than I do, she gets to do it to me.

And we are evil. EVIL. Trust me, whoever wins this little challenge is going to TORTURE the other person. Just imagine - one of us is going to be dressed like an idiot while walking about 3 miles with over 1000 other people who are dressed normally.

Yes. There will be pictures. Lots of pictures. I can promise you that.

So will you please help us? Help Corban and the thousands of others who have this disease - with your help we can one day make CF stand for Cure Found!

You can also help by sharing this post as much as possible. Make THIS go viral. Make it knock that silly Tooth Fairy letter out of the bloggy world because this is way more important than that thing ever was. Corban thanks you. 

Control

My life is crazy. Suddenly it's much crazier than it usually is. And with crazy comes stress.

I have a love/hate relationship with stress. Obviously, it's bad for me (ok, bad for everyone) but at the same time, I work best under pressure. Give me an impossible task with a deadline, and I'll get it done with time to spare - but give me all of the time in the world and I won't get it done. I am the Procrastination Queen at times (hello? 70 days to get ready for a half-marathon?) and it usually bites me in the butt.

I'm also a bit of a control freak. Not about everything, but about a lot of things. I admit it. Sometimes I can let it slide and relax a bit and go with the proverbial flow. But at other times, I go a little nutty with it.

This is one of those times. With all of the stress and chaos and disorder that is going on in my life right now, I feel as though I am totally out of control. And I hate that. But some of the things that are going on right now are completely and totally out of my control. I can't force other people to make up their minds  or to decide what they're going to do and when, and so I'm left just kind of hanging out here, waiting.

So here I go with the overcompensating. I can't control a bunch of stuff that's happening right now, so by God I'm going to control everything else - not that it's necessarily a bad thing.

I've spent the weekend stripping every bed in the house and washing everything right down to the mattress pads - because I can certainly make sure that all of our beds are clean. I've been going through stuff and throwing away stuff and organizing stuff and putting more stuff together to donate because I can do it and get it done and no one can stop me.

I've been going nuts with my datebook, getting everything put down in it for the week so that I can keep track of where I need to be and when (see it there on my desk?) and I've been trying to just get organized in general. I have all sorts of tips saved in my email thanks to my wonderful aunt and I need to go through them again and get to work. But I know for a fact, that if I don't do it tonight - my first job in the morning after I get the kids to school is to organize my desk. The clutter is about to kill me.

And in between now and then every facet of my life will be neatly scheduled in my datebook, because that's the only way that I can keep track of anything, up to and including my own head.

We need to turn it around...

I went into the beginning of this new year full of hope and excitement. I really do think that there are going to be some wonderful things happening for me and my family this year. I was anxious to get this year started for so many positive reasons.

But then the new year started - and it didn't start well at all.

I found out on the second day of the year that one of my friends was going through a personal hell, and as a mother, it hit home for me.

On the third day, we got more devastating news that again, hit me so incredibly hard.

The Dude has been having problems with his truck. My "service engine" light was on. He has to get two teeth pulled tomorrow afternoon.

It just hasn't been a stellar start to the year. But at the same time I know that it could always be worse.

We spent part of the afternoon today working on his truck. Although we didn't get it fixed, we have now narrowed down the problem and are about 98% sure that we know what's wrong with it. He can drive it for now, for short distances, but it needs to be fixed. Of course that doesn't come for free, but we can get it taken care of in the next couple of weeks.

My "service engine" light? I had a sneaking suspicion desperate hope that it was something stupid - and it was. Turns out the gas cap wasn't on tight enough to make it happy. Stupid thing. But the light's off now, so it's good.

Tonight, however.....tonight was hard. As I mentioned the other day, a little boy who was the son of one of Sarah's mentors was killed in a horrible accident last week. As a mother, I can't even begin to imagine the impact of losing a child. I just can't wrap my head around it. After the kids got home from school and basketball practice tonight, Sarah announced that she wanted to go to the boy's viewing. I wasn't sure that it was a good idea, but she and I talked about it and she really wanted to go. I told her she would have to check with her father, since she was supposed to go to church with him tonight. He agreed that she could go, but only if I went with her. So plans quickly changed, Ex1 came and got Emily and Jared, I took Alex and Daniel over to The Dude's house, and Sarah and I went to the viewing.

It was so hard. So incredibly hard. Seeing the little boy's parents and sisters there, and the other mourners...looking at the pictures and the videos from his short little life....my heart shattered so many times tonight. Seeing the pain in his mother's eyes as she hugged me and thanked me for coming....I have tears running down my face as I'm typing this.

All I've been able to think for the past few days is "something's got to give" - there has been too much bad stuff to start off a new year. Way too much. It needs to change, and somehow we need to turn it around. So I started thinking - always dangerous for me to do.

Tomorrow, January 10, 2013 is my 2 year blogiversary. It's been 2 years since I started this crazy thing.  And Sunday, January 13, is both my 42nd birthday and the 2nd anniversary of the day that my 2nd divorce became final.

I need to celebrate. I want to celebrate. I want to be happy. While I can't forget about the bad stuff, I can't focus on it - and I don't want anyone else to focus on the bad stuff either.

So what do we do?

I know what I'm going to do. I've always been a huge fan of the "Pay it Forward" movement (as is my good friend over at Mom-troversial) and I'm going to start making a really conscious effort to pay it forward as much as I can and in as many ways as I can. I have a pile of stuff sitting by my front door already that needs to be donated - and it's going to go out this week. We have toys that the kids have outgrown or they don't like or whatever. Guess what? They're going out the door too.

I've made up my mind that I am going to do as much as I can for two of my favorite local organizations too - our homeless shelter and our women's safe house. I have my own personal reasons for choosing those two in particular, but they're going to be getting some of my time, my money, and any of my "stuff" that they can use.

So - for my blogiversary and for my birthday, this is the best gift that anyone could give to me (*cough* along with a pair of warm fuzzy slippers so that I don't have to keep wearing The Dude's that are 18 sizes too big for me *cough*). Go out and do something for someone. Donate something somewhere. Be nice to someone. Donate something that you don't need anymore instead of selling it. Volunteer your time. If you have the cash, make a donation to a local organization that needs it. There are so many ways that we can make someone else's life just a little bit easier, but we overlook those things so often in our hurry to deal with our own lives. Pay it forward, people. Please.

So go and do it, and tell me what you did. Leave it in a comment here, post it on my facebook wall, send me an email, whatever. Tell the world that you did it, and maybe you'll inspire someone else to do the same thing.

Random stuff and a personal request

A little bit of crafty stuff....

I'm participating in this quilting swap thingee. I can't think of what it's actually called right off of the top of my head, but basically there are 5 people in a group. We each make a row. Then we send our row to the next person, who adds a row. Then it gets sent to the next person, etc etc etc. So when we get our first row back, it now has 4 more rows attached to it, all made by different people all over the country.

Anyway....this is the row that I got from one of the ladies in the group. She is going with a "rustic fall" theme.

I laid it out on my bed and stared at it for a while, trying to figure out what to do with it next. I had a couple of ideas but decided against them and decided to just make some more traditional squares.

Of course, I wasn't paying attention on the first square, and it came out way too small, so I had to start over. But as of right now, I have 2 squares done, and I'm hoping to get the other 3 done this week so that I can get them attached and mail her row on to the next person - and then wait for the next row to come to me.

It's a fun project, and something that I've never done before - so I'm really anxious to see what my quilt looks like by the time that I get it back - although that won't be for several months yet.

In other news, I've been on a quest for a new datebook for the past couple of weeks. I had bought my typical little cheapie from the dollar store, but they changed the format of the pages in it and it just wasn't going to work anymore. I looked online to try to find something, but I didn't really like (or couldn't afford) anything that I saw there. I had to take The Dude to the dentist today and when we got done there we had to go to WalHell to get his prescriptions filled and so I looked at the datebooks that they had there.

It's a little bigger than I wanted and it was a little more expensive than I wanted (I'm a cheapskate. I admit it.) but it has lots of room and I think that it'll work just fine. I already started transferring information into it while Emily was at basketball practice tonight - when I wasn't dealing with argumentative kids who wanted to do absolutely nothing but irritate the snot out of me for the entire time that we were there.

Now....for the request.....

Please forgive me for the vagueness of this, but I just can't go into specifics because of the situation.

I have a friend, a dear friend from high school. Our lives went in different directions after graduation, but we stayed in touch for years and then lost each other, and then found each other again through the miracle that is facebook, and got to see each other live and in person last summer for the first time since graduation (I think), and I got to meet her kids, and it was wonderful.

Anyway, she is now going through something that I believe is probably the worst nightmare that a parent can endure, short of the death of a child. I had heard about the situation before, but didn't realize that there was a connection between it and her until today, when we exchanged some brief messages. My heart is breaking for her and her family right now, and I can't even begin to imagine how she is feeling. She is devastated and heartbroken and there is nothing that I can do to help her except to be there for her and love and support her from afar, and it just doesn't feel like enough.

So I am asking you to please, say a prayer for her and her family. Or if that's not your thing, send a happy thought or a good vibe or something to her. Go out and do something to help someone else. Make a donation to a charity. Something. Anything. She's in the midst of hell right now, and something good has got to come out of it. Somehow. Some way. And I don't know how else to do it.

There's too much bad crap happening in the world. Go do something good.

The randomness that was my day.

Holy wow. This has been a super productive day.

I managed to get up a little bit earlier than usual (ick) and got all of my bills paid (yay) before I took the boys to school, and then I took off and headed out for my walk that I promised myself. It was a chilly 30ish degrees when I left the house, so I had to bundle up a bit - but it was beautiful and sunny and it felt so incredible to get back out there again.

I always wonder how this tree stays upright...

Winter wheat poking through the ground...

Always the height of fashion *snort*

Old sign

Part of "my" trail. It's so much prettier when things are green.

 6.23 miles and a quick shower later, and I got my act together enough to go get gas in the van and go pick up The Dude so that we could go grocery shopping. We decided to head to a discount grocery store, and at the same time met up with a friend who was collecting coats for the homeless - so we both got rid of some stuff that's been gathering dust in our closets. Bonus!

It might not look like a ton of groceries, but it's more than 3/4 of what was on my list for the month, and it only cost about $124 - by the time I get the rest, and with the odds and ends that I'll have to pick up throughout the month, we might get by with only spending about $200 on groceries - definitely a score at the grocery store!

On the way back home from the grocery store, I decided that I was going to splurge a bit. I don't drink very often, but lately I've been in the mood for some wine so I stopped at the liquor store. I wandered up and down the aisles before I picked - and yes, I picked these based solely on their names.

I'm a little lot more twisted than I what I usually
admit to on here. Don't judge.

I also managed to get a bunch of laundry done, make some cookies for the kids' lunches, and get a Christmas tree. Granted, the tree is still on the front porch, but at least we have it in our possession.

8 feet of fabulous, wonderful-smelling, glorious
TREE!

And finally - another one to add to the "my kids can sleep anywhere" files...

When did doing the right thing become amazing?

Note: I have a ton of pictures and stories from the weekend, and I will be posting some of those. But, instead of doing that tonight, I want you to think about something. This is something that has been eating at me for the past few days.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Over the past few days, I've been on a mission of sorts to help out a friend who found out that she is gaining custody of 3 little boys. She lives about 3 hours from here, but since we were planning on going down there this weekend anyway, I figured it wouldn't be a big deal to gather some things to take to her.

Granted, I did not expect to end up with as much as we did.

I didn't expect to have so much stuff that we would have to tie some of it onto the roof of the van to get it there. I am so thankful that it worked out that way though.

To me, this is not a big deal. She needed help, and I was able to find some things for her and take them to her. I didn't do it for public accolades and admiration - I did it because it was the right thing to do.

Along the way, I actually had people question my motives. Some people chose to believe that the whole thing was a farce - that I was collecting the things in order to turn around and sell them for my own profit.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, I had people tell me that I was doing such a wonderful thing, and that it was just so amazing. Those are actually the comments that really got me to thinking about some things.

Why is it so amazing that I would collect some things for a friend in need? Isn't that what we, as civilized human beings, are supposed to do? Aren't we supposed to help people when they need it?

What I did was not amazing - I did what needed to be done. I am so thankful that I was able to do what I did to make this transition easier for these babies and for my friend and her husband. Collecting stuff to take to her was a no-brainer - but to many people it was like I moved mountains.

Don't get me wrong - I'm so incredibly grateful for everyone who was able to donate items to her. And I totally understand that many people were unable to for so many reasons. I know that times are tough right now. Financially, I'm not able to do much to help her. But, we had this trip to see her planned and budgeted already, so tossing in a few extra bags of goodies wasn't that big of a deal. And it was important for my kids to see what we were doing - it is important for them to understand that while we may not have much, we can still help someone else.

Doing the right thing for someone shouldn't be amazing. It should be normal. Doing the right thing should be a way of life for everyone - not a rare occasion for a few people.

Think about it. The next time you hear about someone who needs help with something - really think about it. Figure out if there is a way that you can help. Sometimes, even if you think that you can't do anything, you might be able to find someone who can.

Water works and more laundry

So the city actually showed up here a little bit before 8am today and started working on the water leak in front of my house. Of course, Daniel had to go outside to watch - and he had a blast. As it turned out, the leak was in the fitting(?) between the main city line and the line coming into my meter. Once they got it dug up and figured out what it was, it didn't take them long to fix it at all, and I was only without water for about an hour or two. The water guys did what they had to do and then left the big gaping hole in the street for the street guys to fix - so far they've filled it with sand, tamped it down, and stuck some cones around it.

I did manage to at least weed my (pathetic excuses for) flower beds while we were outside watching the guys work.

Other than that excitement, I spent most of the day doing baby laundry and trying to organize the donations - more came in today, believe it or not! I'm still not quite sure how we're going to get all of this plus 5 kids and 2 adults in the van on Saturday, but we'll figure it out - that's on the agenda for tomorrow. Hopefully we can get it all packed tomorrow and then Saturday morning we can just get up, eat breakfast, and leave!

Here's most of it. Yes, most. Not all. Most.

Again, I can't thank everyone enough for their generosity. I already took one big bag of stuff that I knew she couldn't use (some adult clothes, some girl clothes, and tap shoes...yes, tap shoes) to the thrift store in town today to get it out of my way, and hopefully I can even start bagging up some of this stuff tonight. The generosity that has been shown has been amazing, not only to me and The Dude, but also to my friend - she's been watching these posts and although she isn't saying much publicly because of confidentiality issues, she has asked me to express how grateful and appreciative she is. I am so thankful that I can be a part of it.

Doctor, potential sinkhole, and lots of laundry

I had to take Daniel to the ENT this morning - nothing major, just a follow-up. He had his second set of tubes put in his ears and his adenoids removed just over 2 years ago, and his pediatrician just wanted to have the ENT take a look at them again. Everything checked out fine, and we don't have to go back again for another 6 months - at that point, if the tubes are still in, the ENT might go ahead and remove them, but he's not too concerned about them right now. Luckily this kid has been uber-healthy so I'm good with just maintaining the way that we are for now.

In the meantime, I noticed this morning that there was a puddle of water in front of my house, but I didn't think too much about it. Then later this afternoon, after The Dude got here, I noticed that it was still there - and it was exactly even with my water meter. We went out and looked, and sure enough, the water is seeping up through the street. So I called the water department and was told that they'd deal with it in the morning (it was 4:50pm when I called). But at about 5:30, the city guys showed up, looked at it, and said "yep, the water line is going to need to be fixed, but it can wait until tomorrow" - uuuuuhhhhh ok. You want to put some cones around it or something? "Nah, it'll be fine." Whatever. It's definitely getting worse, but I still have running water - until about 8am, when they're scheduled to fix it. Luckily, it's on the city side of my water meter, so it's not affecting my bill...but they did warn me that depending on what they find, they might have to tear up my (already hideous) yard. The pavement is already getting squishy out there, so it's just a matter of time and traffic before a sinkhole appears out there.

I've been working on baby laundry all day long - started at about 7am and it's still going. I had to go to a meeting at my church tonight, so The Dude came over and stayed with the kids while I went there - and unbeknownst to me while I was gone he did a few more loads of laundry and even ran the dishwasher since I won't have any water tomorrow. Then he helped me to fold a few loads of it and sort it out - there's some girl stuff (and some adult stuff) mixed in, so we're putting that stuff aside to donate to the thrift store here in town.

This.....this is what we have done so far. There's still a few more loads to finish yet. Yes, there is a loveseat under there somewhere.

Tomorrow, other than running the kids back and forth to school (and folding laundry) I actually don't have a whole lot of stuff happening. Another friend is bringing some more baby stuff over in the morning, and once we get everything sorted we're going to start bagging it up to make sure that we can even fit it all into the van. I have a double stroller that I want to take to her too, but I have a feeling that we're going to have to put that on the roof of the van (literally) to get it there on Saturday.

I have actually caught some grief for doing this - someone (not anyone from this blog or my facebook page, but someone from a group where I had posted the request for donations) seriously all but accused me of gathering all of this stuff so that I could sell it and keep the money for myself. I'm amazed that someone could even think that, but I refuse to let it get to me. All I know is that I am so incredibly grateful to everyone who has helped with this little project - you all know who you are, and I couldn't have done it without you. And to The Dude - thank you. For watching the kids tonight, for helping with the dishes and the laundry, and just for everything.

The most amazing friends in the world

If you are a fan on my facebook page, then you might have seen a post from me yesterday that said this:

I know that some of you live in the greater Wichita area even though I don't know you personally, so I'm going to post this here too. If you can help in any way, please let me know.....

I NEED YOUR HELP!!! I just got a call from a friend, and she is getting custody of her cousin's 3 kids. All boys, ages 4 months, 18 months, and 3 years. They have NOTHING. Her own son is 14, so she has no baby stuff. She is getting beds, but she needs pretty much everything else - crib sheets, blankets, clothes, toys, bottles, sippy cups, baby gates, outlet covers, potty chair/seat - you name it, she probably needs it. I am going to go through my boys' clothes and see what I can come up with, but if anyone has anything else that I can get THIS WEEK please let me know - I need it by Friday.

I posted the same thing on my personal page, as did The Dude, his mother, and a friend of his. I wasn't sure what kind of a response that I'd get, because I know that times are tough right now. I hoped to be able to pick up a few odds and ends for her so that she wouldn't have to be quite so stressed with the transition of getting 3 new babies all at once.

Before I knew it, offers started rolling in - almost faster than I could respond. Friends, friends of friends, even people that I had never met before started posting comments telling me what they had. I started gathering addresses and making plans, and this evening The Dude and I (and Daniel and Alex) went into Wichita and went from one side of the city to the other. All in all, we made 6 separate stops gathering donations.

To put this in perspective: Two of these people were my friends - women who I have met before, been to their houses before....I *know* them. Three of the women are members of a group that I am in - of those three, I had met one briefly before, but I never met the other two until this evening. The last one was a long-time friend of The Dude's, but I had never met this couple.

Out of all of these people, none of them have met my friend. They have no idea who she is. They took the time out of their busy schedules to go through and pack up items that they no longer needed in order to give them to a total stranger.

This....this is what we came home with tonight:

We. aren't. done. yet.

There is more. More offers are pouring in - even now, as I type this. I have another friend from church who is bringing stuff here on Thursday. My neighbor heard what was going on and he added in the big blue bag that is just clothes. More people are willing to help.

I am so incredibly grateful right now, and even a touch overwhelmed. The generosity of strangers is completely and utterly amazing, and I can't thank these people enough for their kindness. Being able to help her like this means everything in the world to me. As I sit here and think back in the not-so-distant past, I remember the generosity of friends and strangers that helped me to get through some of the darkest times in my life, and I feel so blessed to be able to help her when she needs it.

I am amazed. Grateful. Thankful. Overwhelmed. Humbled.

To everyone who has helped, or still wants to help:

Thank you from the bottom of my heart. You all are amazing.

The gloves have been donated!

I really don't think that Alex could be any happier than he was after school today.

We didn't get a chance to drop the gloves off before school for a couple of reasons - one might have had something to do with the fact that I hadn't showered yet...so I dumped him at the door and went back home.

I had gotten the oil changed in the van this afternoon, so The Dude was hanging out with me and we went to pick Alex up from school together. When we got there we went down to Alex's room to get him and to return a book that his teacher needed, and I handed him the bag of gloves.

He took them up to the office, and he was thrilled when the school secretary told him that he could put them on the tree himself.

Of course, after he did that, we had to search the Lost & Found for his own missing glove (only one, mind you) and then wander down to the cafeteria to find his lost sweatshirt. That kid would forget his head if he wasn't attached - not sure if that's genetic, but forgetting things seems to be a familiar trait for some reason....

Still, forgetful or not, I'm so proud of him. I don't know that he completely understands what making a donation like this means, but I know from personal experience that it will be appreciated by the person on the receiving end. Over the past several years especially, my kids and I would not have had anything for Christmas several times had it not been for the generosity of strangers.

Seriously, there was one Christmas where I did not have the money to get my kids anything. ANYTHING. I could barely keep the utilities connected, and only had food through the food stamp program. I was working, but I just couldn't keep up with everything.

Did my choices lead me to that point? Yep. So don't even bother lecturing me on that one.

The point is that my kids had one of the best Christmases ever thanks to the generosity of strangers. They got more that year than probably any other year of their lives. It was incredible. The donor was anonymous, so I had no way to thank him or her or them, other than an (also) anonymous letter to the editor in the newspaper.

Things are still tight for us, money-wise. But nowhere near as bad as it used to be. I can keep the utilities on and the van payment current and the roof over our head - and we are no longer on food stamps. We have a little bit left over most months - sometimes less than I would like - but we are so much better off than we were even a year ago.

I know that buying a few inexpensive pairs of gloves does not even begin to pay forward what we have received in the past - but knowing that my kids want to do things like this makes me one proud mom. They don't know the full details of how bleak our finances were, but they know that we had help. Someday, I'll explain it to them when they are old enough to understand. Right now, I'm just happy that they want to help someone else that might need it.

Hat and glove saga, continued...

Alex has been bugging me almost non-stop since the other day when he tried to donate his own hat and gloves to charity to go to the store to buy some that he could donate. With Daniel not feeling well yesterday, we didn't get to go then.

But, thanks to yet another schedule change today, I had a little bit of time after I picked him up from school and we went shopping. I had told Ex1 the story and he told me that he had seen gloves on sale at the local grocery store for $1.00 per pair.

We got there, and sure enough, there was a big bin of them....I told him he could pick out 5 pairs. We looked for hats, but couldn't find any. Boo.

But, we successfully got the 5 pairs and they are in a bag with his backpack so that he can take them to school in the morning. Hopefully we'll be able to get up and around fast enough that I can actually go in with him and get some pictures of him putting them on the tree - I know that he's excited to do it. Although if we don't have time we'll just wait until next week and maybe we'll find some hats to add to it as well.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

In other news.....I dumped the pictures off of my phone tonight, and found some that I hadn't posted so I figured I'd amuse someone with them.

This was Daniel's Potato Head creation that he made in the church nursery the other day. He was very proud of it and had to keep it together until after the service when I could come and see it. I have to give him points for creativity, especially for the tongue mohawk!

The sky was gorgeous this morning.

But I still hate mornings with a passion.

Hate this. Even more than I hate mornings. But on the plus side, since I did do it tonight, I don't have to worry about it tomorrow *and* I was able to get my much-needed Diet Pepsi at the same time. I really need to watch my stockpile more closely. I also need to not wait until the gas gauge is below "E" to fill it, and then it won't hurt so much.

So, tomorrow, I get to get up at 5:30am, do the school run and all of that fun stuff. Supposedly, as of right now, there is no practice or anything scheduled so we should have a normal afternoon (as normal as they ever are around here) and evening. We only have one basketball game this weekend so that will cut down on some of the chaos, and no other real plans. I need to do some Christmas shopping (ugh) and finish decorating at some point too.

The fun never ends!