Where I am...

You may or may not have noticed, but I haven’t been around as much lately. Some might think that’s a good thing (ha) and some might be wondering what is happening.

There is so much going on in life right now. This job is kicking my butt. I know, I know – people work every day and it’s not that big of a deal. But face it – I’m not used to it. I didn’t work outside of the home for years and I was still busy every day. Now, I’m gone for roughly 45 hours every week – yet I still have the same amount of stuff to get done around the house. There’s still the same amount of laundry (if not more, thanks to my greasy work clothes) and the same amount of housework and the same amount of yardwork….. except now that all has to get crammed into the time that I have left.

The Dude helps with the stuff around the house when he can, but as of this week he is now working full-time as well. So now we both have crazy schedules and somehow we have to try to fit in time for us to be able to spend time together along with everything else that has to be done around here.

Fall sports have started, which for me means volleyball games every Thursday night. Emily has a tournament tomorrow morning that is being played about an hour from here, and could last all day long. The girls have practice every day after school, so on the days that they come back here they don’t get here until after 6:00pm. By the time we eat and do homework, we’re all so tired that we crash – and then have to get up early the next day and do it again.

I finally got a new phone the other night – but now that I did that, I no longer have my unlimited data plan, which is what I use to access the internet. We added a phone to my plan for The Dude so we share the (now) limited data – he doesn’t use much, but we have to be really careful about how much we use, or it’ll get really expensive, really quickly. So I’m just not online as much, unless I go to his apartment to use his computer or go to the library to enjoy some peace and quiet. While I’m not online as much, I’m working (still) on freeing up some space on this ancient machine so that it’ll hopefully run a little smoother.

So needless to say, I just won’t be around as much for a while until things calm down a bit. I’m looking into options for cheap home internet so that I don’t have to worry about the data usage on my phone as much, but honestly that’s not a high priority right now. We are still working on getting a house of our own, and that is taking longer than we had hoped – but with each month that passes, we are one step closer. My credit is *thisclose* to where it needs to be, and hopefully it’ll be over the top before the end of the year – and then we can actually start the purchasing process.

So many things that are changing in our lives right now – at times I sit back and think about all of it, and it can be a little overwhelming and chaotic and stressful to say the least. But I know that we’re moving in the right direction, and we’re going to just keep on going until we get to where we want to be. I know that we're going to get there - it's just going to be a little crazier than usual along the way.

More volleyball and craftiness

So today was Emily's last round of volleyball games. She didn't get to play because of her back, but she still went and stood on the sidelines and cheered for the rest of her teammates.

Sarah was a line judge again.

Not necessarily impressed with having to sit and watch.
Again.

Bored, bored, bored.

After we got home from the games, I worked on the quilt top some more. I got the top completely assembled, and now I just have to figure out what I want to do as far as the quilting goes on it. Actually, I know what I *want* to do, but I don't know if my sewing machine will cooperate long enough to let me do it. I need to get it all set up tomorrow - but I have to wait for The Dude to get off work so that he can help me do it, because I need another set of adult hands.

I also played around with the little keychain pouch thingees that I got the pattern for the other day - still trying to tweak them to get them to come out exactly right, but I'm definitely getting closer!

Tomorrow, Alex is supposed to go with his father for the day - which leaves just me and Daniel for most of the day. We'll go to church, and then come back here and hang out and clean and sew until The Dude gets off work, and then we'll just add him into the mix!

Parting shot - seems like just last week we were dealing with the constant 110-degree heat. I'd like to have that back please. I do not like turning my furnace on during the first week of October. That is just wrong.

Crazy day - but in a good way

So. It's been a long day. A really really really long day.

But at the same time, it's been a really good day.

Snapshots of the day - literally:

Because I had to have Emily at the orthopedic surgeon at 7:45 this morning (ugh) The Dude came over to take the boys to school for me. So he rolled in my front door at about 6:00am - normally, that would be reason for me to be not-so-nice to someone - but when that someone comes bearing donuts and chocolate milk, all is forgiven.

We ended up having a breakfast picnic on my bed.

The breakfast picnic then caused me and Emily to run around the house like idiots so that we could get out the door in time to get to her appointment - which we did manage to do. With time to spare, actually. And this is the view that greeted us at one point on our trip this morning...

The appointment itself was fabulous - after we waited for close to 45 minutes to be seen. Seriously, how does that happen with a 7:45am appointment? How can they be running that late 15 minutes after they open the doors?

Anyway, the orthopedic surgeon was a very nice guy. He examined Emily - and really questioned her about her pain and whatnot. He talked to us and listened to our concerns. He showed us the xrays and went over them in detail with us. And his final determination is that she does NOT have any compression fractures. He still wants her to stay out of sports for a month just to be safe, because she does hurt - and he'll check her out again in about 4 weeks just to be sure. But she's ok.

When I got home from that, I found a package in my mailbox - one that I had been expecting. A friend of mine had a spare digital camera laying around, and so she sent me her old one! I have been without mine ever since the tail end of our vacation this summer and it's been driving me nuts - and now I have one again. It's actually a really nice little camera, and a little more advanced than what I'm used to, so I'm sure that I will be spending quite a bit of time over the next few days weeks taking lots of pictures to figure out all of the settings on it. And I know she's getting tired of hearing me say "thank you" but I'm saying it again - THANK YOU!!! You are awesome, and I appreciate it so much!

Then we had Sarah's volleyball games this afternoon/evening. 139.2 miles round trip to get to these games. We didn't get home until almost 10:00, so getting the kids up for school in the morning is going to be more of a nightmare than usual. But, she played well - and there's only one week left!

Downtown really reminded me of "Back to the Future"

Victory! (Sarah in white jersey)

Meeting with coach

When we finally got home from volleyball, the kids all went straight to bed (one bonus of being out so late) and I'm sitting here looking around my trashed house debating what really needs to be done before I go to bed.

I'm actually leaning towards nothing at all. I might just hit "publish", clear off my bed, and crash.

Tomorrow's another day.

A quick project

I took a little bit of time today and went in town to a quilt shop that is closing. All of the stuff in the shop was marked down 25% today, so I went to see what I could find. I managed to restrain myself and not buy any fabric, but I did go through the patterns and I found a few things that I just couldn't resist.

One of the patterns that caught my eye was for something called "Key Fob Pockets" - just a cute little pouch that can be attached to a key chain or purse or backpack, and used to carry ChapStick (my addiction) or a USB drive or other little trinkets.

It took me about an hour to make it. It wouldn't have been that long but the directions kind of sucked and I might have put it together wrong the first time and had to tear it apart and redo it....so it's crooked and a little wonky, but that always happens with the first one.

Now I have better ideas for how to make it easier and faster - and to make it look better when it's done. So now I'm all sorts of excited to make more of them. And sell them. Yup yup.

So other than my craftiness tonight, it's been kind of an 'off' day. I finally decided that I was going to take a nap go straight back to bed after taking the boys to school - and I crashed hard for a couple of hours - before the phone rang and I had to go pick up Daniel from school. He got hit by the Vomit Rocket again and had it all over him from head to toe. I got him home and cleaned up and he was fine for the rest of the day - like I knew he would be.

The usual Wednesday night chaos wasn't quite as bad as it typically is. Sarah and Jared ended up going back to Ex1's house so that his wife can take them to school in the morning - The Dude is coming here in the morning to take Alex and Daniel to school - and I am taking Emily to the orthopedic surgeon (Ex1 is meeting us there). So the morning is going to be a bit funky, but at least we figured out a way that Ex1 and I could both be at the appointment, and all of the other kids would get to school. After we are done there, he will take Emily back to school.

Tomorrow afternoon, we have to travel about 70 miles each way to get to Sarah's volleyball games - which means leaving directly from school when I pick up the boys and heading straight there. Once again I'll be packing supper in a cooler to eat in the stands at the games. I love watching the games - but not the chaos that they tend to create. We'll be lucky to get home by 10pm and then getting the kids up for school Friday morning will be a nightmare.

Thankfully, volleyball is almost over. Then we get a break for a couple of weeks before it starts all over again with basketball - but this time there will be 3 kids participating instead of just two.

I. can't. wait.

Life keeps happening.

It seems like every time things seem to calm down a little bit, they go right back into an uproar...

We had the whole volleyball injury on Saturday...which meant that yesterday was spent getting her into the pediatrician, who then consulted with a neurosurgeon... and at that point we were simply told to eliminate sports for a month and see what happens.

Given that this is her BACK that we're talking about, Ex1 and I discussed it at length and we decided that we are going to get a second opinion - that way, if the injury really isn't that severe - we don't have to worry so much. But on the off chance that something was missed, we'll know now instead of later.

Today was spent making phone calls to make the arrangements to pick up the xrays from the hospital and then to make an appointment with an orthopedic surgeon to get the second opinion. I got that scheduled for Thursday morning, but the receptionist strongly suggested that I come and get the "new patient packet" before then so that I could get it completed.

So I went and picked up the xrays and then made the 60-mile round trip to the orthopedic surgeon's office. On the plus side, now I know where it is so it'll make Thursday morning a little less stressful. The trick will be getting the other 4 kids to school, but Ex1's wife and The Dude will be helping there so that Ex1 and I can both be with Emily at the doctor. And I'm glad that I got the paperwork now, since it took me over an hour to complete all of it. Ugh.

Last night, Alex had Scouts again - and he was absolutely thrilled that he finally got his shirt! He feels all sorts of official now, and has been working on memorizing the stuff that he needs to remember. He likes going to the meetings, and Daniel has fun too - even though he's technically not a Scout.

We found out last night that the one little boy who goes to the meetings is actually Nice Neighbor's grandson - I had seen him at the meetings before, but just never put the two together until last night. So now when he comes to visit his grandmother, he and Alex can play together, which is always a good thing. He's not over there very often so we don't know him well, and he goes to a different elementary school than Alex does so this was a good opportunity for them to get to know each other.

Today was Daniel's first day of all-day kindergarten! He has been looking forward to this day for months. I swear that he's been asking since the first day of school when he could go for all day, and now it's finally here. I dropped the boys off at school for breakfast this morning, and then used my 7 1/2 hours alone to get some things done around the house - not to mention all of the running around that I had to do as well.

When I picked them up from school this afternoon and asked Daniel what it was like to go to school all day, all he could say was that "it was AWESOME!!!!" He's growing up so fast - and I'm just thrilled that he loves school as much as he does.

 The Dude came over this afternoon and we finally got to spend some time together. We took the boys and walked up to a local Mexican restaurant for an early supper. The chairs were all carved and painted and colorful - we were trying to decide if they were handmade or not, and I'm not 100% convinced either way.

 This was the back of the booth where Alex and I were sitting. OK, it looks really really cool - but it's really not that comfortable to lean back against, especially after eating the massive amounts of food that we got.

 I can't decide if the look on his face is cute or evil. I'm kind of leaning towards evil at this point.

After we all ate and got the check, we were amazed at the price. It was about half of what we were expecting to pay. We both looked at the total a couple of times, and then I realized that we were only charged $0.01 for each of the kids' meals - then we realized that this was one of those restaurants where kids eat for free on Tuesday nights.

SCORE!

After we ate, we walked back home and stopped to take a few pictures of the wildflowers along the way. I got the boys bathed and into bed and then The Dude and I hung out while he watched a movie and I filled out the paperwork for Emily's appointment, and then he had to go back to his place to take care of some things.

And now, as usual, it's time for me to work on more laundry and more cleaning and more stuff around the house before I finally crash for the night....

Volleyball with a side of pain

We got up this morning and prepared for another fun-filled Saturday morning full of volleyball games for Emily.

Unfortunately, it didn't turn out that way.

She played her heart out through the first match, but they lost.

That's Sarah in the stripes, line judging.
Emily has on the long black shorts and tall white socks.

Then before the second match started, she and her teammates decided to explore. They found this set of steps that went up from the gym and they wanted to see what was at the top of them. It was the weight room. So they came back down the steps.

The Steps of Doom

And that's where the day went horribly wrong. Emily slipped or tripped or stumbled or something and went down the last 3-4 steps on her back. And if you look closely, you'll see that they're cement. No padding.

Long story short, Ex1 took her to the hospital, and I followed. The Dude took the boys and my van and went back to the house while we took care of her.

We honestly thought that she was fine. We figured that they'd do x-rays and say that nothing was broken and send her home - but we were ok with that because then we'd know that she was fine. After a lot of poking and prodding, a few hours, and several x-rays, it was determined that she did indeed end up with some minimal compression fractures in two of her vertebrae. The ER doctor feels that she won't need any sort of treatment or anything because they are minimal - but he wants her to take it easy for a few days and then follow up with our doctor on Monday.

So Ex1 gave me a ride back home since The Dude had taken my van, and Emily went and hung out with some friends to watch a movie (that had already been planned) for a few hours. She came home and crashed  on the couch pretty soon afterwards, and I'm just allowing her to sleep there tonight. If she's comfortable, I'm not going to make her move.

I swear, this week has it out for me for some reason. We had our drama from the other day and then this today - hopefully this is the end of it, because I'm exhausted and I need sleep.

They're trying to kill me.

Just a really super quick recap of our day.....

Up at 5am. Breakfast for the herd, dress the herd, get the herd in the van to make the 30 mile round trip to drop everyone off at school.

Came home, enjoyed the peace and quiet, did some cleaning and played around online for a bit. Oh, and got officially registered for another 5K on Saturday evening.

Walked up to Daniel's school to get him and walked back here. Tossed him into the stroller (we were running a little short on time and I was tired of carrying him on my shoulders) and walked to the library to return some stuff and then to the store to get toilet paper (very important) and a birthday gift for one of Sarah's friends.

Came home, dumped the stroller and jumped back in the van to make the 30 mile round trip trek to get Sarah from school and get her to the dentist.

Made the 30 mile round trip trek to take Sarah back to school.

Came home for about 10 minutes and then went to get Alex from school.

Came home for about 45 minutes, then took off to make what should have been the 4th 30 mile round trip trek to school for Sarah's volleyball games.

Do you see that serve? That serve is amazing.

Then after the game, I got suckered into giving one of her friends a ride home. No big deal - or so I thought - until I found out that she lived 10 miles in the opposite direction from where we had to go. So, that 30 mile round trip trek turned into a 50 mile one.

So if my math is right, that's about 140 miles just running back and forth to school. 

Oh, and on the way home, we saw a strange glow in the distance. And smoke. What's funny is that I've now lived in Kansas long enough that when I see that I automatically think "field fire". We could see this one for about 10 miles, and we were still at least a mile away from it when I took the picture. Yeah, bad picture, but it was the best I could do. And if that's what it looks like from over a mile away, you can imagine how intense they are up close.

So we got home, I chased them all into bed after some snacks, and then I had one more thing that I *had* to do, and that was to make a bag for the aforementioned birthday gift - cheaper and more fun that just a typical gift bag. And cute too. There are just 3 bottles of nail polish in there, but Sarah is thrilled with the little bag, so we're good.

And now, it is time to find my bed under the mountain of laundry and attempt at some point tonight to get some sleep. I'm just mentally going through my schedule for the next few weeks - is it sad that I'm excited that I might get to sleep in until 7:30 on Saturday morning?

Weekend shots

It's been kind of a weird weekend. Not bad. Just...off for some reason.

Maybe it's because Alex's father actually took him for the weekend, and so he was gone for 49 1/2 hours (a new record). It might have been because I just didn't really feel good all weekend. Maybe it was the weather. It could have something to do with The Dude working a lot of hours this weekend (and not feeling well himself) and so he hasn't been around and I miss him (sappy, huh?). Maybe it was just a combination of all of that plus more.

Anyway...here are some shots from our weekend. It was another one of those weekends where I was busy the whole time, but didn't get much done.

Started out with Emily's volleyball games Saturday morning...

Emily serving while Sarah acted as line judge

Love this old gym. The bleachers? Not so much...
We did a bunch of running around after the game, including a quick run to the library while we were out and about.

I can not believe that I allowed her out of the house like that. And yes, those are pajama pants.
Remember the apple tree that I found a couple of weeks ago? We finally got back up there to pick the apples.

Picking apples

There's a reason why I bring my kids along on these adventures - and it's not just for the family bonding time. They're better climbers than I am.

Just a little dew-covered patch of wildflowers

Not as much as I had hoped for, but still enough for a few batches of apple butter in the coming week or so.
Now, about a month ago or so, I went on another garbage bag rampage with the kids' toys. They refused to pick stuff up and put it away, so I picked it up for them - and all of the toys went into a big garbage bag and the bag went outside beside the trash can. Now I admit that I did rip it back open again at one point, because there was actually a shoe in there that was needed - but other than that the bag was not disturbed.

And then it rained. And I forgot that the bag had been torn open. Grrrr.

I finally relented and brought the bag inside yesterday - I figured that with the issues that I've been having with Weird Neighbor, I didn't want him to "help" me by throwing the bag into the trash can for me. A lot of the toys did go into the trash (oh darn). Some of the plastic stuff went into the dishwasher and some of it went into the sink. And on one of the toys, we found a new friend....

Somehow the other day, Alex managed to rip this shelf out of the wall. Apparently, he accidentally reached up to it with the broom handle, accidentally hooked the broom handle around the end of the shelf, and then accidentally pulled it out of the wall.

I just love how those accidents happen. He's lucky there were just bins of hats and gloves up there, and not something really heavy.

But I finally got around to fixing that today.

The rest of the time has been spent cleaning and doing laundry and cooking and doing dishes and all of that fun stuff.

I still just feel....... bleh. But I have determined that no matter what happens in the morning, I am going to force myself to go out and walk/jog after I get the kids off to school. I'm not sure how far I'll go, but after the incredible workout the other night, I need to do something to keep myself going.

Now, I just have to stick with it.

Just random fun and happy stuff...

I don't really have anything profound to say tonight....but I do have some fun pictures....

One of the best things about fall...

The Dude took me, Daniel, and Alex out to eat the other night. It's always an adventure...

Guess what? It's been raining! Ok, not a lot, and not enough, but it's been raining off and on all day. And it's glorious. And I love it. And it needs to just keep coming down...for about a month.

Sarah had volleyball games tonight. That girl amazes me every time she serves a ball.

Her glasses, however, were less than impressed with the game (new ones are already ordered).

Beautiful sunset on the way home from the games though.

Looking back over these pictures from the last few days just reminds me once again that life is good.