Sydney is 9!

It turns out I DIDN'T get a chance to blog on Sydney's birthday. The day was full of fun, but also a fairly typical Sunday, in that we went to church and the kids played outside most of the day after we got home. I figured I would post something after the kids went to bed, but we had a little dinner party with some of our neighbors, and time got away from me. (The dinner was NOT hosted by me -- it was a pseudo-baby shower for one of the families, and we also sang happy birthday to Sydney and shared her cake.)

Sydney went to bed with a smile on her face, so it was a successful birthday.

I have a list of things I need to tackle before Ruthie wakes up from her nap, so I have to end this having shared only one picture. I'll share more later, I promise (I think)!

Happy Monday!

'Twas the night before...

...Sydney's 9th birthday.

(By the time anyone reads this, it WILL be Sydney's 9th birthday).

As predicted, it was a whirlwind of a week during which I felt behind on what I needed to accomplish, and also confused as to which day it was. (Chet felt the same way.) But we survived!

Friday Chet got home from work and Lorelei pounced on him to assemble her new Target shelf. Thankfully she, Ford, Ruthie, and the next-door-neighbor were available to help him figure it out:

We mostly stayed home today (Saturday), other than Chet attending a funeral this morning, and Sydney and me grocery shopping to pick out her cake ingredients. Right now the second (devil's food) cake is in the oven (because sometimes I like to go big or go home by making a double-layer cake). Chet is on the couch with his feet up after wrapping presents. I'm going to finish the second half of "Black Panther" after the cake is out of the oven.

That's the last of the black and white buffalo check wrapping paper and I AM SO GLAD. Not because I don't like it (it's adorable), but the roll of paper is too large for my wrapping paper holder, and I was on a mission to use the last of it before moving. (These are the ridiculous types of things that take up brain space in a frequent mover's head.)

There goes the oven timer. I hope you had a lovely Saturday! Birthday post tomorrow!

A Great Weekend (now I'm behind!)

This was a perfectly-timed 3-day weekend. We are sometimes known to squander away our 3-day weekends, but after going to Disneyland, then having two weeks of a normal routine, this particular 3-day weekend was a welcome break.

(Although, I DO tend to feel slightly behind for the rest of the week when we have such holidays, but that's okay.)

We didn't do anything spectacular (other than KonMari Sydney's and Lorelei's treasures, which was spectacular to ME), but Chet and I both thoroughly enjoyed the days, and we were each able to tackle some small projects that made us feel accomplished (without ignoring the children in the process). I did NOT end up falling into any organizing black holes, which was a relief to Chet (and probably because of Chet).

Here's what Sydney and I started with Saturday morning:

Again, we didn't need to tackle ALL of her belongings; just her "treasures." Papers, art supplies, trinkets, small toys. They were previously stored in a few different places in her room, so we put them all in a pile and streamlined everything (and threw away a lot). I was very proud of her cooperation; this is not her favorite type of project.

Spoiler alert: we ended up tackling Lorelei's belongings over the weekend as well. In a shared room it's hard to do one without doing the other, and it just made sense to go ahead and get it done.

Unfortunately, I don't have a transformative "after" picture to show you. In truth, the room doesn't look very different, but knowing that Sydney has laid hands on EVERY SINGLE ONE OF HER BELONGINGS and decided whether or not she wanted to keep it (and then to find a logical, organized place TO keep it), is a GREAT feeling.

Ruthie started feeling under the weather Sunday afternoon (a slight fever and cold symptoms), but she's on the upswing as of today. Here she is Monday, then today:

Clearly, when you're dressing up as a cowgirl and riding a Sydney-made horse, you're feeling better.

Speaking of Sydney (and me), we got our hair cut yesterday! We both cut quite a bit off:

Is that not horrific?

I don't have a picture of myself yet, but you can see Sydney's haircut in the picture above -- we're both feeling very free with our shorter hair!

Happy Tuesday, friends!

3-Day Weekends PLANS

Happy Friday!

First of all, I did indeed catch up on my Bible study, and had a wonderful Wednesday morning fellowshipping with a lovely bunch of ladies that I will miss dearly when our study ends.

Besides Bible study Wednesday morning, I went to the grocery store Thursday morning, but otherwise have stayed home. Laying low this week has helped us all to feel secure in our normal routine, and I no longer have have large mountains of laundry to conquer (just a couple of small hills, which is the norm).

Our homeschool community group meets this morning; we get home around 1 p.m. each Friday, and Chet has already told me he has to work late this evening. But since he's off Monday, here's what I have planned for this 3-day weekend...

...dumping all of Sydney's (and maybe Lorelei's, depending on how it goes) items in a single pile on the floor and helping her establish some better storage techniques for all of her "treasures."

!!!

Honestly, it sounds blissful to me (seriously!), but Chet and I have to work together and plan for such projects, because a 3-day weekend full of organizing sounds very bad to him.

Sydney and I are starting on the project first thing Saturday morning, then she has a birthday lunch date with a friend (for the friend's birthday, not Sydney's), so she'll be leaving at 11:30 a.m. That will give me time to continue sans Sydney, which is usually a good thing. Then Sydney AND Lorelei have a birthday party down the street at 2 p.m., which I will also attend with them. So hopefully (Chet's fingers are crossed!) the organizing project is finished by 2 p.m. on Saturday. I doubt it will be 100% complete by then, but this will at least prevent me from disappearing into organizing black holes the entire weekend.

For the record, the girls' treasures are NOT out of control. Sydney needs (and appreciates!) guidance on going through and storing her things. Lorelei can, and does, do it on her own, but also needs help weeding things out from time to time. The biggest "problem" currently is that they have a couple of drawer sets they use for their things that just aren't working. Tackling their items NOW will also help me feel more organized for our move (less than 4 months away!).

Surely your weekend plans are more exciting than ours -- I hope it's a great one!

Tranquil Tuesday

It's been raining here in the Central Valley for the past couple of days. And by 'raining' I mean barely sprinkling off and on throughout the day (no such thing as downpours here!). Nevertheless, everyone is hunkered down inside. It's resulted in the children behaving wildly indoors occasionally, but mostly it's allowed me to catch up on things at home after being out of town.

I still need to organize my pictures from Disneyland (and tell you all about it!), but here are a couple from the breakfast we ate at Goofy's Kitchen:

Our homeschool community group met this past Friday, but I feel like we're officially back to a full school routine as of yesterday. It's been a fruitful couple of days.

In addition to laundry, I'm also catching up on the Bible study I attend Wednesday mornings. I missed our first post-Christmas meeting last week, and am hoping to finish 2-weeks worth of curriculum before our next meeting (tomorrow -- eek!).

Something distracting me from all this catching up I need to do is Liane Moriarty's new book Nine Perfect Strangers. I thought I was something like #115 on the library wait list, but it was miraculously ready for me to pick up over the weekend. I have NO CHOICE but to read it as soon as possible, because we'll be living in Mississippi before it would be available for me to check out again if I don't finish rightnow.

How's your Tuesday going?!

Happy Birthday, Chet!

It's another special day -- Chet's birthday! (And Jenni's birthday, his twin sister!) He hasn't said as much, but I know he is VERY glad his birthday fell on a Saturday. Right now he's enjoying pursuing the aisles of the new Harbor Freight store that opened nearby (alone, because children don't love perusing).

It's been a simple day, but a great one so far. He slept in (a little), didn't have to cook breakfast or clean the post-breakfast kitchen (he's usually on constant kitchen duty on the weekends), and we enjoyed a walk with Ford and Ruthie to a further away playground (as opposed to the one right behind our house). For dinner we're having Greek yogurt chicken and asparagus, with key lime pie for dessert.

The children are appalled that he only has two small presents to open.

We love you, Chet! Happy, HAPPY birthday!

Ford is FIVE!

Happy 5th birthday, Ford!

Birthday season is upon us! As always, Ford kicked it off with a very low-key, compressed-against-another-event birthday (getting everything packed to leave for Disneyland tomorrow).

Last year we arrived home from our Florida trip the day BEFORE his birthday -- and we were all so exhausted we waited several days to even celebrate. Poor guy. Thankfully, he has very low expectations when it comes to his big day (unlike other children in our home, ahem), and he's just happy to be another year older.

Here's what we did today:

He's pointing to his cake, wondering if he should add another Star Wars decoration to it. I talked him off the ledge.

The icing looks yellow, but it's actually light orange. This cake is the very definition of, "Hmm, what can we scrounge up to make this feel festive even though your parents didn't plan well for this?" He was happy just to help decorate. 

We love you, Ford!

Scatterbrained

I'm constantly finding scenes like this around my house:

I mean, why are there so many post-it notes taped to my wall, with random names and initials and drawings on them? It's a little creepy (and now I know why we never have sticky notes or tape).

Anyway, I'm scatterbrained right now because on New Year's Eve we decided we were going to take a vacation to Disneyland IN LESS THAN A WEEK. (We thought we'd be going in February, but it made more sense to go NOW.) We leave Sunday, and will be visiting the park Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday (and also driving home Wednesday). We start back to school Friday (the 11th), so in addition to preparing for the trip, I'm also having to prepare in advance for school. But we are EXCITED.

Happy Thursday (it's Thursday, right?)!

Happy 2019!

I love the new year. As usual, I'm full of resolutions/plans/goals (call them what you want!); maybe I'll share them in another post, but since we're moving this year, a lot of them revolve around pure survival.

We had a day at home, other than Chet making a quick trip to Home Depot while Ruthie napped, and me running to the Navy Exchange for a pack of pull-ups this evening. Chet goes back to work tomorrow (he's been off work since Christmas Eve), and I fear reality is going to drench us like a bucket of ice water tomorrow. Oh, well (at least my Christmas stuff is put away).

Happy New Year!