Brief Update

Well I'm just finishing up second cup of coffee this morning. The sun is shining though it's still quite cold outside. Today I feel rather exhausted but need to leave soon to go up to the house. We are getting closer to a move-in date...Trim work is being installed, electrical hook-ups are being finished. I'm hoping that when I get there today the hot water heater will be working and that soon we will have restrooms completed. That will leave the kitchen to be finished - and the master closet. The closet is not such an urgent thing - we could move in without it being done - the lining is in and we are just waiting for hanging racks and shelves. I hope to take some more pictures today in addition to getting bathroom shelves covered, fridge and freezer cleaned. I'm not working on cleaning windows yet as there is still too much construction dust.

Laid Off

B got laid off this morning. We don't know for how long - if it's temporary or what. All we know is that for now he's out of a job. Emotions and thoughts run wild at the moment - it's been a long challenging day.

I know that God has a plan and that He has promised to provide for us. Right now that's all I know.

A Few Wedding Pictures

O.k...I am finally going to post some long-awaited wedding pictures. I've been staying away from blogging because I couldn't decide what to post and I was feeling guilty about not getting the wedding pictures up. I'm not going to include many as I'm not hugely keen on having family completely identifiable on the web. However these should give those of you who've been waiting at least an idea of how things looked that day.

I think - though it's rather hard to see in these pictures - that what stands out to me most when I look at them - is how absolutely happy I look. Glowing is probably the best term for it. I normally hate having my picture taken but this day I could not stop grinning. Some of it I know is that I did things in God's order. Some of it is that I've been blessed with a second chance at love - loving and being loved. I know that marriage is still a lot of work but it's not something I expected to ever be blessed with again.

My attendants were all in "wildflower" colors - the dresses turned out gorgeous - and each girl looked fantastic in the color they wore. The guys were good "foils" in jeans and white dress shirts - and all have worn those outfits again (repeatedly). I love the way the colors looked together - and my bouquet turned out fantastic as well - also basically wildflowers.

Everything was fairly simple - the reception felt a bit "rushed" to us - I know I was overwhelmed by the number of people around and the activity. But we all had a fairly good time I think. I did go barefoot pretty much the entire day - except a couple times while walking outside. Being as I really don't know how to dance - dancing was fun.

Bus Training and Other Ramblings

I'm just finishing up my much needed second cup of coffee and a snack. We had bus driver training this morning - SWAT team training. Basically we ran through what might possibly happen if we ever had a bus h*j*cked and how the team would come in and begin to sort things out. There are so many possible variables in such a situation that it's pretty much impossible to plan for every possibility. However I think most of us drivers came away with a much better idea of what to expect in such a situation - and we managed to have a lot of fun doing it. Picture - if you can - a conventional yellow school bus filled with 20 - 30 laughing, talking, carrying-on middle-aged adults crammed into seats intended to hold small children - Suddenly there's a very loud noise outside the bus and a team of uniformed "armed" men come busting onto the bus shouting orders. That was enough of an adrenaline charge for me - I hope and pray I never have to experience something like that in real life with children under my care - with a real "bad guy". But it was good training - and far more interesting than some we've sat through.

The sun is mostly shining outside - it's a crisp cool fall morning - leaves are falling everywhere. I am thankful to be able to take things a bit easy this morning - I need to run to B's work to pick up some paperwork but think I'm going to put that off until after school. Instead I'm going to get the kitchen cleaned and hopefully some packing and baking done.

Thankfully I've found my disk for my card-reader so that soon I can download pictures again. I'm excited about that as downloading from the memory card is so much easier for me then taking it to the camera store to have them put the pictures on a disk that I later have to download after all.

Not getting my flu shot this week- between the current treatment for poison ivy and the cold I've been fighting I will be waiting about 10 days. I'm kind of glad because I didn't want to add that on top of everything else.

Enough rambling for now - coffee is finished - it's time to get some work done.

Monday Ramblings

Well....I'm not sure I have time to write this and get it posted before it's time to get ready to go back on the bus. On the one hand I feel like I've accomplished a bit today - dining room table is cleared off, laundry is folded while more is cycling through the machines, kitchen counter is tidied and wiped down, chicken soup from last week is divided into bags and frozen, meat is out thawing for supper and family room is tidied. Before afternoon route time I will hopefully be able to switch laundry loads out one more time as well as fix my hair just a bit.

The weekend was very very busy - Squirrel had his conference meet on Saturday morning. He is the 7th runner on his team so got to run "varsity" - he did very well - ran the distance of 1.9 miles in 13:58. Having said that - running varsity means there is less runners and therefore he came in almost last. However he was pleased with his time and that's most important. I was able to watch him run before I headed off to B's dad's for the auction that was held this weekend. Stretch went with Dipstick and B first thing in the morning to be there before everything started. Squirrel was dropped off around 2:30 pm. None of us made it home until well after 7:00 pm Saturday night. I think the auction went well overall - it was certainly a learning experience for me as I'd never been before. I truthfully don't understand how those auctioneers can talk so fast - it was amazing.

B bought me a large copper kettle in a stand - not for making carmel corn as it can't handle getting that hot. My current challenge is to decide exactly how I want to use this pot. I have always loved copper - plan to decorate part of the new kitchen with copper jello molds and cookie cutters. (We found some on our honeymoon at a very nice price so they are stashed away waiting to get settled). B's suggestion was to polish it up, put something neat inside it - for display and top it all with a piece of glass. It's in too nice a shape for use as a planter...we will see. Most things went reasonably ok at the auction - the tractors brought more than expected, the truck brought considerably less. B was able to get several items that he wanted and could use in his shop. At least one of them was something he'd helped build many years ago. I hope and pray that enough was sold to keep his mom and dad financially stable for the rest of their lives.

As far as the house is coming...the kitchen is now tiled and cabinets likely should be going in this week. The master bedroom is completely painted and has floor down - as does part of the "great room". The cherrywood is up on the wall in the dining area - it looks really cool. Flooring is down in both the "hall" bathroom and the mudroom and both those rooms are painted. We have agreed on a stain color to finish the wood trim throughout. I think we still have another trip to the home improvement store but not sure when that will happen.

Tonight Stretch has a choir concert at the high school. Squirrel has his very last crosss country meet this afternoon. Dipstick has boy scouts but not sure if he will be going or not. I am still fighting cold symptoms and allergies (mold count is up around here). Crops are coming in...it's unseasonably warm here - the trees are all shades of brilliant oranges and reds. No pictures organized to post - no time at the moment.

Well I am definitely down with a cold or something - running fever, the whole 9 yards. I'm driving my bus today but otherwise am staying home puttering around. I've filled a couple of boxes with books, sorted some out, taken a nap and done some laundry. I'm about to put a chicken in the crock pot for home-made chicken noodle soup. It's my favorite comfort food for when I'm fighting an illness. What's yours?

Monday

It's Monday...been awhile since I've taken time to write here. Nothing much is happening - just daily life mainly. I'm a bit "coldy" at the moment - thought it was allergies yesterday but have decided it's likely a cold trying to come on. I'm drinking fluids and taking vitamin C and trying to sleep when I can. I came home from my morning route this morning and took a nap immediately. However since I got up I have been puttering around the house - doing laundry, packing, tackling clearing off my craft desk. The craft desk can be seen again - while there is still stuff on it it's no longer a "Fibber McGhee" attack waiting to happen. The pile on the floor is still there - I may get to that before afternoon route time. The challenge is that I've packed up part of the craft room but not all of it - therefore what's not packed is no longer really organized. I feel like I'm accomplishing though and that's needed.

I talked to my girlfriend who took our wedding pictures over the weekend. She said at least some if not all of them will be in the mail today. Hopefully by the end of this week I will be able to see how they all turned out. I'm both excited and a little nervous about that. She's an excellent photographer - I'm most definitely NOT an excellent subject.

We did not have a Saturday meet this past week. That was lovely to be honest. We spent the day up at the house - cleaning and painting. Floors are not in yet but Squirrel's room has one coat of paint. Both the "little" bathroom - outside Squirrel's room and the mudroom mostly have one coat of paint on them. The family room (more of a "great room" I think) is painted and the kitchen has 1 coat - except where cupboards will hide unpainted areas. Those are being left primed. The master bedroom has 2 coats on most of it - then we ran out of paint. Lights are up in most rooms - not the "little bathroom" and not completely in the master bedroom and closet. This week kitchen cabinets should go in - as should flooring in most areas that are painted. We still must make at least one more trip to the home improvement store to get door handles and kitchen knobs. I have no good idea how long the finishing will take - we don't have trim yet to my knowledge - but am really thinking that we will be done by the end of this month. Though moving is difficult and there will still be lots of sorting and packing to do I am eagerly anticipating being able to get in and get settled. I still have lots of wood to stain and seal - have to decide on color for that yet. I am still taking pictures as we go but have not been able to find my disk so I can download them to the computer.

B is off this week - planning on spending most of the week helping his dad get things finished up for the upcoming auction this Saturday. (Squirrel has a meet so I will miss part of the day - it will be emotional for B's family as the auction is happening because his dad is terminally ill). I do plan to go up there a couple of time to take pictures of preparations and some of the antiques. To me - while it's heartbreaking on the one hand it's also fascinating to see and be able to learn about the antique tractors and stuff. I'm really hoping though that we can get at least one breakfast date in as well.

There are parent/teacher conferences to attend, cross country meets and other activities. It will be another busy week but should be interesting.

We are on a scheduled School Improvement Day this morning - that means that we all go in 2 1/2 hours later than normal. It was nice to be able to sleep just a wee bit this morning - still had to get up to get Dipstick to his bus stop. It's quite cool this morning and the weathermen are predicting cloudy with a chance of showers. However at the moment the clouds are scattered and glimpses of the sun can be seen. I am thankful for that as the last couple of days have been rather gloomy.

Last night I drove another cross country meet for the boys - the last one that the middle school and high school have together. No PR's for the boys though I felt both ran fairly well. Stretch especially had a nice kick at the end of the race - I can't always see him take off for the last 100m but this time I could. He was pretty discouraged when we got home though - feeling rather like the other guys on the team would prefer he was not on it. Guess there were comments made about me as the bus driver (and his mother) and my appearance as well as other comments about personal stuff on a couple of the other guys. Stretch didn't share all of it with me - just enough that I could see how much he was hurting. I'm certain some of it is that he seeks to live out his faith by his actions and words rather than "preaching" - that is guaranteeded to bring in some "picking on". His character shows through - he doesn't take shortcuts on the races and practices when others do. Some of it is also due to the fact that teenagers can be just mean.

It hurts me as his mother when I see him hurting - I still want so much to be the "protective mama bear" and stand up for him. But I know that I absolutely can't do that. He's going to have to learn to handle this kind of junk by himself - all I can do is stand by to comfort and encourage and pray for him.

Guess it's about time to scoot and get ready to drive.