Coming to a Nursery Near You

Archive for the ‘life’ Category

Because so many people I know personally have found their way to my blog, which is completely my fault, I also have to edit what I write when I’m upset.  Those postings are posted somewhere else, and if you’re interested, you can email me for that.

This is the edited version of my birthday weekend.

Friday, I received lots of facebook greetings, my mom sang to me TWICE, and the kids & Jimmy bought me a chocolate cake and a Hoops & YoYo card about sharing said birthday cake lol

Saturday, we went to lunch because Ryan’s gives a free birthday lunch/dinner for your birthday, and it was yum and we all overate, and then wanted to pass out.

We had Libby’s (and Jimmy’s) hair cut.

We also went to pick up some sort of rack for Anthony & Jimmy’s musical equipment obsession.

We came home and did some stuff.

Then Jimmy & Anthony went out birthday shopping, and when they came home, they gave me the gifts. They included kahlua & creme coffee, two very nice blouses, a photo album, James Patterson’s new book, some new grill toys (kabob rack & grill pan) and ummmmmmmm – oh, a card they then lost LOL

 

  Sunday, I went to the Flower & Garden show up in Hagerstown for a few hours, hoping for some nice flower pictures, but didn’t really get much.  The lighting was awful and there were very few actual flowers.  I did attend a seminar on bird houses & feeders, a new interest of mine, and bought a few things like garlic jelly (not nearly as good as Stonewall Kitchen’s!), some pepperoni bread from an older couple who just looked so … bored/sad/lonely (which sucked), and a very pretty yellow gerbera daisy plant that I have named Charlotte.

 

On the way to & from the show, I photographed some pretty substantial flooding that I came across, and also had a photo printed into a poster for someone to buy from me from our area’s freecycle off-shoot group.  The photo came out great even at 16” x 20” so that’s pretty exciting, to know my work will hang on someone else’s wall besides mine.

 

This is the photo that was purchased:

 

My friend Jane went to Florida this weekend, and a tiny part of me wonders if it’s maybe to elope

My sister’s got a blackberry and I’m insanely jealous now.   As I mentioned on Facebook, I’ve been thinking about a Kindle and want one even more now that I find out it has free wifi.  I can’t count the number of times I’ve wanted to do something online while I’ve been out on errands, and can’t because I have the cellular equivalent of two tin cans and a string for a cell phone.

 

Anthony’s hockey season has begun – this is his first time in a league of any sort, so he’s excited, as am I. Sorta.  I was watching him practice just SKATING the other day, and when he fell, my heart leapt into my throat.  Can hardly wait to see THAT happen more often.  NOT.

I often tell my kids that they can do anything they want to do (with their lives).  Anything.  Of course, 13 yr old Anthony has already planned out his life.  He’s going to be a rock star.  In fact, he’s already recording his first CD.  Seriously.  He’s engineering it as well.  Seriously.

Libby has big plans as well.  She’s going to be an artist, and also about a half dozen other things.  BIG plans, that one.  BIG.

I’ve always encouraged whatever new ‘thing’ they had discovered that had an interest in, buying the necessary supplies and providing the necessary lap space for explanations, the necessary ear for a newly learned song. 

So why is it, then, that just a single compliment that I received last night from my photography had me calling everyone to gush over?  LOL

I’ve received many compliments over the years on both my writing and my photography.  I just have never taken compliments well, I suppose.  Typically, the people complimenting me are the ones that have known me for most – if not ALL – of my life. So it’s hard to take those compliments to heart because those people are BIASED (yes, I’m talking to YOU, Mother).  But last night’s compliment from the photography instructor from the Portrait Photography class that I’ve been taken stood out. 

Of course, I still minimized it in my head, because truthfully, the photograph that he complimented had everything to do with my daughter’s beauty, and then my skills with Elements, more than anything else.  But still, it was nice to hear that encouragement from the teacher, a well known photographer and former National Geographic photographer.

The photo that he complimented me on was this one, and the compliment was not only that he loved it, but that he wanted to see it on my website (which I did when I got home!) and he could easily see this photo hanging in a gallery somewhere.  Nice, huh?!

I’d brought it to show as part of my work I’d done in the class.  In week one, we had to use a reflector outside.  After I’d finished forcing my kids outside to take their pictures in the COOOOLLLLD, I came in to look at them, but the effect didn’t really show up as much in this one, but her eyes, HER EYES, as always, got me and I went to work.  LOL

I’m looking forward to his next class, which focuses on black & white photography and learning more ways to torture my kids (they’re sick of having their pictures taken LOL)

Last Wednesday, I came down with a stomach bug. Fever, vomiting, everything that a stomach bug entails.

Anthony was able to hold the fort down until Jimmy came home, when he went into quarantine mode and locked me in my room for the next 2 days. 

By Saturday morning, I was feeling better, so I got to work *trying* to clean up the mess I’d made and the bigger mess they’d made.  I managed to get the dishes all washed, and all my sick clothes cleaned.

Of course, with the storm going, I couldn’t get out to buy stuff like I should have but I had gone out on Thursday night with a 102 fever to get the necessities, like milk & bread (don’t even say it).

Well, Saturday afternoon, Anthony started feeling lousy.  Saturday night, Libby started feeling lousy.  Libby didn’t throw up but Anthony did.

Sunday, I managed to get some help and got the driveway plowed so I could go out and buy one thing I didn’t stock up on – DIAPERS.  So off I went, after having loaded the dishwasher (but not running it), ran the washer with the last of my nasty bed linens.  When I came back from a rather harrowing run to the store, I went to wash out MORE dishes, and the water from the faucet simply stopped. 

I checked under the sink, I checked the bathroom sinks – no water.  Uhoh.

I called Jimmy, but he was wrapped up in a hockey game w/Anthony on the PS2. I hmmmed and tried it again. Nothing.  I came in to check on the computer for solutions, but nothing really sprang to mind.  When Jimmy finally got around to it, he went to check and then called his father, as they have well water too.  His father had him check the pump breaker, which was fine, but other than that, was clueless too.  I finally called the management company, to whom we write a very big check to every month.  Meanwhile, Jimmy’s stomach had started cramping up on him and he was very tired all of a sudden.  Anthony had been up and down all day but was at least up at that point.

90 minutes later, I had heard nothing from the management company, so I called them back, leaving a more detailed, urgent message , including I HAVE SICK KIDS!

They called back minutes later. There’s really nothing they can do, it’s Sunday, people are still snowed in, it’s the Super Bowl (HE SERIOUSLY SAID THIS TO ME), yadda yadda yadda.

I said umm… we have NO water. I couldn’t even buy water at Walmart because they had none.  We have NO toilets.

Apologetic, but clueless.  He called the plumber.

The plumber called me right back.  Explained to me what he’d have to do because it sounded like the well pump had burned out.

The well pump – which is buried under anywhere between 150 to 750 feet OF EARTH, plus ya know… TWO FEET OF SNOW.

Well, ain’t that just lovely.

Jimmy & I brought snow in to melt and use in the toilets for last night, and things went smoothly, basically.  He really started feeling bad again, so he went to bed at around 8 and I shuttled the kids into bed before 10. 

At 3, Zachary woke me up yet again, kicking and whining. I figured he was wanting yet ANOTHER bottle (again, please DON’T go there), and when I came back, he was asleep IN my spot – so I stayed up.  I got on my computer, to complain, mainly.  Then I heard that all too familiar sound of a child getting ready to spew.

Child Number Three, Come On Down! YOU are the next contestant on The Puke Is Right!

Well, I didn’t hear it IN TIME, because before I took the 3 steps between my computer chair and my bed, he’d already tossed his milkcookies everywhere  – every.where.

Unfortunately for Zachary, he’s never been sick like this before, so he just has NO clue why we’re suddenly plunging him headlong towards a bucket and he just wants to keep turning his head – but ya know, the thing was – he didn’t WANT THE BUCKET. Nooooo, he’s much more content to just turn his head and let it ooze/fly out of his mouth and down his neck, into his hair/ear/my poor dead mattress.

Good times.

He continued to wake up to throw up about every 20 minutes for the next few hours, but finally fell asleep for a while. The plumbers showed up at 8am, and by 1:30pm, we had a new well water pump, which they had to extract from 605 feet BELOW the earth (and snow). 

Once they got to work, though, I headed to the bank and the market and when I got home a couple of hours later, I’d brought them coffee & donuts and they told me that in 10 years of working in the state of WV, I was the first person to ever buy him coffee in the cold like that.  But omg, 15 degrees or so, pulling out cable from the ground, then having to put it back in, all the while it being so cold and wet. Ugh.  They deserved coffee & donuts!

When I got home from the market, though, Zachary was up and around – back to his crazy busy self, seemingly unfazed by his ordeal during the night.  I’m crossing my fingers, toes, eyes, younameit that we’ve come to a very abrupt ending to a crappy weekend and for very LITTLE snowfall for tomorrow.

And now?

SHOWERS FOR EVERYONE! YAYYYY.

EDIT:  Spoke too soon! Libby started last night.  Good times.  My poor babies.