The point of no return

The first thing I have to say is this...............It won't matter to me how sick Gage is the next time, he WILL be going to school! That little boy can be on his death bed and I will take him that way and prop him up on a few pillows. You would not believe the amount of homework he brought home yesterday from school for the 3 days he missed! And, you've heard me complain before about what a nightmare it is to do homework with Gage. We started on it last night and I could see it was going to be an ugly weekend because it was going to take us every minute of it to finish all of those worksheets. They are not at all difficult, but Gage likes to hurry through them without really reading the directions. Every time he brings stuff home, he's usually missed a couple of things and only because he was rushing through it. When I ask him what the right answers are, he always knows them and then rolls his eyes because he missed it. I have tried explaining to him over and over to SLOW DOWN and then double check your work. This child has an excellent report card, and I know if he would slow down and take his time, he would have E's in everything (an E is exceeding level of expectations all of the time). So, after we finished 2 worksheets last night, it was decided that we would wait until today to do anymore. It started out okay, but it quickly went downhill from there. As usual, he's hurrying and making mistakes, so I point it out to have him correct it. He only half erases things and then writes right over the top making it sloppy and illegible. Of course I can't stand that, so I make him erase it again and do it again. Well it is just a vicious cycle that we get into. Thankfully Scott was able to take over. He had more patience than I did and they actually finished all of the homework today. At one point I told Gage that if he could do the rest of his homework without a bad attitude that I would buy him a Bakugan ($5 each) for every sheet of homework he completed. I knew it was a safe bet. He started out pretty strong, but eventually he became overwhelmed and lost control and then lost his shot at earning $100 worth of Bakugans. That ticked him off even more, so again, you see the vicious circle we were in. After finishing his homework, I was reading one of the sheets his teacher sent home. Monday will be their 100th day of school and they are supposed to bring 100 cents and 100 other items to display on their desk for all the 2nd graders to parade through each room to see everyone's displays. I couldn't think of anything that Gage had 100 of. Yes, I know we have over 1,000,000 lego pieces, but I wasn't really wanting to go there. Emma offered him 100 of her Littlest Pet Shop pets. (Please don't be surprised that she has over 100 of these...............you know me...............all or none!) He didn't want to take "GIRL" things! We were looking through his things and he wanted to take his Bakugan cards, but only had 25. He thought about Webkinz cards, but only had 32. Then he thought about Yu-gi-Oh cards and before he even got to counting them, something made him think of Lego guys. I told him I didn't think he had 100 lego guys. We opened his drawer and started digging them out and I was actually starting to be surprised at the number and thought to myself, "Crap, maybe he does?" After we dug them all out, droids and all, and then had to break into some of his new lego sets he has gotten for his birthday and Christmas that haven't been opened yet to get the guys out, we came up with 89. OMG! I can't believe he had 89 Star Wars/Indiana Jones Lego guys. So, now we are at the point of no return. I am completely embarrassed to even say this because it was such a stupid thing to think and especially say out loud, but I said something about maybe they would have a set of Legos that were just guys and we could buy it and have enough. Scott wasn't thinking clearly either, because he didn't OBJECT like he should have! We proceeded to go to Walmart to have lunch at Subway (one of Gage's rewards for doing all of his homework) and then walked back to the Lego aisle. I found one set that was just 4 guys, like a police officer, fireman, etc. Gage thought that was completely lame of course. None of those stupid Star Wars or Indiana Jones Lego sets had more than 4 guys in it (we needed 11) and now after seeing that, and doing the math at how much this stupid idea was going to cost, I had to just leave the aisle. I couldn't even believe we were doing this. And of course, in the meantime, Emma is scanning the toys up and down the aisles trying to find something for herself. I seriously just wanted to leave. But, as cleverly titled, we were at the point of no return. We left Walmart, $69 later, and I told Gage and Emma that I swore I was never going to go to Walmart again unless I was by myself!!!! I'm so embarrassed by this whole stupid ordeal that I told Gage if he tells anyone about this at school, he will be in such BIG TROUBLE it isn't even funny. And here I am, blogging about it. In my defense, not that I am defending this idiotic plan at all, 14 of those dollars were spent on a book for me because I needed to buy the 4th book in the Twilight series.....................oh, and Emma made it out of there with a $5 Play-doh set............................have I ever mentioned how much I HATE Play-doh? Need I say more?

Back to school today

Gage went back to school this morning. He's feeling much better, although his throat is still sore. I am also feeling much better today, and like Gage, still have a sore throat. Maybe I can use these past few days of illness and hardly any nourishment to jumpstart a new weight loss plan? I'm certain I've lost a few pounds over this whole ordeal.


I also went in to work today in the library and was glad to be back! The day went very well.

I got a report from Emma's teacher yesterday when I picked her up from school that she has been behaving kind of silly in class lately. We talked about it on our walk home, and of course she couldn't remember any details about her day that would suggest any silliness. Thankfully, today, when I asked her teacher if there were any problems, she said that there were none. I have never had any reports of anything negative, and this wasn't really that bad to begin with, so I was a little shocked. I'm thinking this little red-haired girl is going to be a challenge, and I'm certain is the reason why I have been noticing more and more gray hairs popping through. By the way, I have stopped pulling them because I'm afraid I may end up going bald. Baldness runs in the family, so I don't want to help it along if I am ever going to experience thinning hair. We have parent-teacher conferences coming up in Feb., so I will be anxious to hear more about how things are going.

Positive throat cultures

The nurse from the doctor's office called yesterday to confirm that Gage and my throat cultures were positive for Strep. Gage had already started his antibiotics so they called in a prescription for me that I got started just after lunch yesterday. She said they consider you contagious until you've been on the antibiotics for 48 hours, so both Gage and I are home sick again today. Feeling pretty rough this morning, I might add. I had a terrible headache most of yesterday and at bedtime I had taken everything I have for headaches in the medicine cabinet. I was up frequently throughout the night and my stomach was hurting, so wasn't sure if it was all the meds, or if it was because I was hungry. Scott brought me some toast in bed after he got back home from Biolife and that seemed to help, so it must have just been hunger pangs. My throat is quite sore this morning, as is Gage's. I'm hoping we can both be well enough tomorrow to go to school and work. I had to call Mrs. Schmidt last night to tell her I wouldn't be at the library again this morning. She's very nice and understanding about it all. I think everyone in the library has had something or other. I suppose those kids must cough all over those books and contaminate them up for us to touch and then catch whatever it is they had. I do remember one kid coughing terribly in the library last week and I told him to cover his mouth. He replied, "I am!" Well, not very good! He was at least partially coughing into the bend of his elbow rather than all over his hands. I don't know if that's where this came from or not, but it certainly could have.
I didn't sleep well last night and spent a lot of time thinking about Emma's birthday coming up. I had some pretty good brainstorms, so hopefully I can remember enough of them to write down and execute. Hopefully she doesn't get sick between now and then.
I don't have much more to report, since it's like the night of the living dead here at our house.

Strep Throat

Yesterday after I posted on my blog, I went upstairs to make an appointment for Gage with the doctor. Unfortunately our doctor was not in yesterday, so they gave me a choice of a couple different doctors who had openings. I picked the one I picked because we have actually seen him before in the Walk-In clinic, and he seemed pretty good. When I made the appointment I didn't think about making one for myself. Isn't that like a Mom? Making sure her child is being cared for, but ignoring herself? As the day progressed, I just felt worse and worse. Our appointment was at 4:10 and Scott came home from work to take us because I wasn't sure I was in good enough condition to drive. When we stopped at the front desk to check in, I asked the lady if it would be possible to have the doctor look at my throat as well. She said I would have to ask a nurse. When we went back to the office area to hand them Gage's ticket, I asked that lady if it might be possible for the doctor to also look at my throat. She said she would have to ask a nurse. They took us right in, and when the nurse was taking Gage's temperature, etc., I asked her before she left the room if it would be possible for the doctor to look at my throat as well. She said she would ask the nurse. LOL! She was a nurse! Anyway, she must have asked the doctor's nurse and she popped in the door and said that he had a very full schedule and he would not be able to look at my throat. WHATEVER! You can't tell me that he didn't have time to take 3 seconds to shine his stupid light in my throat. Anyway, a student doctor came in and checked Gage out. I told him I wasn't sure who was sicker, Gage or myself. Gage was quite pitiful though. Every time they would leave the room, he would just lie right back down on the exam table. It hurt to talk and he didn't want to keep answering their questions. Finally the doctor came in and looked at Gage's throat and suspects that he has strep throat. When he asked me if it was still cold outside, I replied, "Yes, but I'm not a good person to judge that because I am sick too and also have the sore throat." I was sitting in the office with a sweatshirt on, a sweater that my Mom made me over that, my winter parka AND a scarf and I was still freezing. Anyone who knows me knows that I was definitely sick, because I can't usually wear just the sweaters my Mom makes without sweating to death. He did not look at my throat, but he wanted to know if I would like to have a throat culture along with Gage. He said that if it was positive then he would have to treat me with antibiotics as well. I guess that's all I needed anyway. I didn't need his busy self to look at my throat to tell me it was red and inflamed. The lab results should be back today to confirm whether or not we actually have strep throat. The throat cultures were quite unpleasant. I asked Gage if he wanted to go first or if he wanted me to go first. He picked me of course, and I thought that I would be able to show him it wasn't that bad. Unfortunately it was HORRIBLE and I had tears coming down my cheeks. I felt terrible because I knew I wasn't a very good model for Gage. He had his and it was HORRIBLE too. I think he tolerated his better than I did though. Emily and her family are suffering with strep throat as well, as I read on her blog yesterday, and I think somehow they gave it to us. :-) They prescribed Gage an antibiotic that we started him on last night. He is home from school again today. He's still not feeling well and neither am I. I am feeling a bit better; however. Last night I went to bed with all of the same garb I had on at the doctors office (minus the parka) and I was freezing to death, but a little later I woke up and was VERY hot, so had to take it all off. I guess maybe my fever broke? Scott had checked it earlier and it was 102.2. I'm hoping we both get better today and are able to go to school tomorrow. I also work tomorrow, so I'm hoping I don't have to call in again.

Sick

I was feeling pretty guilty last night that I didn't post on my blog. I was having computer problems yesterday and when I got Scott to fix it for me, it was time to go to my volleyball game last night, at 9:30. When I got home I just went straight to bed. I didn't realize the reason I was so tired was because I was coming down with something.

Yesterday afternoon I had an appointment to get my hair highlighted and cut. I'm not sure about the highlights. I'm hoping it will grow on me. It kind of looks like I have stripes in my hair on the left side of my head. I couldn't get an appointment for any other time but 3pm, which poses a problem when it comes to picking the kids up at school at 3:05. Thankfully Scott was able to pick them up for me and when I got home it was time for us to go to gymnastics. Scott had given Gage some Motrin after school because he was complaining of a headache and sore throat. I asked Gage if he wanted to stay home or go to gymnastics and he said he would like to try going and if he started to feel bad, could he just come and sit with me. I told him that sounded like a good idea. He made it through the entire gymnastics class without any problems. We got home and had supper that Scott had ready for us and Gage started complaining again of his throat. I had him get his p.j.'s on and get ready for bed. At this point I was having a bit of a sore throat myself, just on my left side, but it wasn't really too bad.

I went to play at volleyball and other than just being tired, I didn't feel too bad. I figured it was more because of having been to a cycling class with Kara at 8:30a. Kara asked me if I would like to go to the cycling class with her and I've given her excuses as to why I couldn't every time she's asked, and I decided it was time I better go. This was not the "Silver Riders" group that I had been to before. Click the link if you would like to refresh your memory on that cycling class. It actually ended up not being THAT bad. I suppose because I was smart enough this time to go at my own pace, versus trying to keep up with the instructor. It was still quite a workout, and my butt is very sore. I didn't realize until last night at volleyball that my knees were bothering me quite a bit. I suppose having my knee pads on, which are tight around my knees, exaggerated it a little bit, but it felt like my kneecaps were just floating around in my knees, unattached to anything. There was alot of standing up while riding the bicycle and I suppose that's where it came from. Thankfully they feel a little better today.

Last night around midnight, I heard Gage up and crying. I went to see what was wrong and he said he felt really bad and his throat hurt. I gave him some Motrin and had him sleep on the couch. I figured he would be more comfortable there than in his bedroom where it is 52 degrees! We are having problems keeping his bedroom warm because we have to keep the door shut to keep the cats out, off of his new carpet, and I decided a couple of weeks ago that I needed to know how cold it actually was in his room, so I put a thermometer in there and 52 was the reading. Scott thought he fixed the problem by turning a lever in the basement from summer to winter, but I don't think it helped. I feel horrible that his room is THAT cold!

Anyway, I could see that his not feeling well was going to continue into the morning, but I was hoping he would miraculously get better because I was scheduled to work in the library today. No such luck. He was warm to touch and still had a terribly bad sore throat. I was hoping it's not strep, but after I read that Emily and her family are all coming down with it, I'm wondering if I need to take him to the doctor. My throat was really feeling horrible this morning too and is quite painful to swallow, so I know if Gage's is feeling like this, I feel bad for the little guy. He needs to get his tonsils out, but we've been waiting for a break from school to do that. Gage stayed home from school today, breaking his perfect attendance record. I was happy to keep him home because he really is feeling terrible. I had to call Jan this morning to let her know Gage and I are sick and that I wouldn't be able to come into the library today. I just hated doing that, but I had no other choice. Scott got Emma ready and took her to school for me, so I could go back to bed. I told her to be sure to have her teacher call me if she starts feeling bad.

When I was thinking about my post yesterday, which never happened, I wanted to be sure to tell my niece, Katie, happy birthday! She turned 13 yesterday. Just kidding Katie, I know you're 16 and it's hard to believe you can be that old already. My sister, Jari Jo, emailed me a couple of disturbing pictures that I hope she doesn't mind my sharing with you all. Hopefully this wasn't a secret they were keeping from Grandma Pipi and I have blown it. If it was, just know Katie, she was going to find out sooner or later anyway. I don't know how long you could be around her covering up your nose before she asked you what you were doing. These pictures, right here, are why I am DEATHLY AFRAID of the dreaded teenage years!

OMG! If I had agreed to a nose piercing, we would have had to walk right back out the door after I saw the person that would be doing it! I hate to be prejudiced, but that guy would NOT be touching Emma's nose, or any other part of her body for that matter!!! It will make an interesting scrapbooking page, that's for sure!

Looks like a great way to be celebrating turning 16, with a needle stuck through your nose!! OUCH! I'm hoping the area was deadened. On second thought, it HAS to be deadened or I don't think you would be sitting there with a smile on your face!!!!!!!

While I was getting my hair cut, the beautician's son had come into the shop. One of the other gals in the shop was really giving him a hard time about having had his ear pierced. Apparently he had been wanting it done for sometime and his mom finally said it was okay. While I was there, I asked her if she can do green hair. I'm totally going to let Gage get his hair turned green, so that when he comes to ask me if he can get his ear pierced, or his nose, I will be able to tell him NO! "Remember back when you were 8 years old and you wanted green hair............?"

I also want to comment on the guy's ear that is piercing Katie's nose. Why would anyone do that to their ears? They were talking a bit about these yesterday when I was at the beauty shop too. My hairdresser said that her son would NOT be doing that with his piercing. I want to know what these people are going to look like in another 40 years when they are all shriveled up and old and in the nursing home?

Happy Birthday Katie!

Cookie Rally

We didn't have too much going on this weekend, but the one thing we had on our schedule was the Girl Scout Cookie Rally. I'm sure you are all just thrilled to death to hear our next fundraising event is upon us! However, Girl Scout Cookies pretty much sell themselves, so I'm hoping this isn't going to be too terribly awful on me. As you know, I hate selling things!!! Emma and 2 of her sister Girl Scouts from our troop attended the Rally. I know Emma had alot of fun, so I hope Jadyn and IsaBelle felt the same way. Because this is our first cookie sale, I had no idea what to expect. Of course the entire event felt like mass chaos to me. My friend, and co-leader (a.k.a. "Cookie Mom"), Kara and I attended a cookie training session while the girls went through the different stations. Thankfully IsaBelle and her Mom showed up for the rally and was able to take the girls through the stations while we attended the training session. They described this event as a "Come and Go Open House" so we had planned for the girls to be picked up by Scott and Guy so we could attend the training session. Well, it was more like a "Come and stay" Open House, so I was very grateful that IsaBelle's Mom was able, and willing, to take the girls through the different stations until the back up reinforments arrived.


Jadyn, IsaBelle and Emma are filling out Cookie questionnaires. They were to fill out who in their home, school and Sports team like Girl Scout cookies and then in the box below they were to draw a picture of what they thought a million boxes of Girl Scout cookies would look like. That was interesting to see how their minds were working and I was impressed with Emma's idea. She drew several straight lines across the box, then several lines up and down, making a grid with lots of little rectangles! I guess she had a bit of an advantage since she knew what $11,000 worth of Cub Scout popcorn looked like in our garage this fall!


The girls went through several different stations, getting their passports stamped, which later earned them a new Cookie Rally patch. At this station, they are visiting Idaho and learning about potatoes.



They then used "potato sacks" for some sack races. I wasn't sure it was such a great idea to be having sack races on this slick floor, but as far as I saw, there weren't any girls that were knocked out cold from wiping out and bonking their head on the concrete floor!


Jadyn's race against the older, Junior Girl Scout didn't seem too fair, but she blew her away. She must have some of those super jumping abilities like her Dad!

I wasn't too impressed with the cookie training, but thankfully Kara, (a.k.a. Cookie Mom) volunteered to head up the cookie fundraiser since I took care of the nuts and magazines. I guess if Kara is the "Cookie Mom", I would be known as the "Nutty Mom". Yes, there is an inside joke here, but it would take too long to explain it.

Scott's Special Talent

I know you've all been sitting on pins and needles just waiting to see what Scott's special talent is; the thing he thinks can top Guy jumping up and hitting his head on a 9 foot ceiling.

There's been a "Go-rill" (Gorilla) sighting in our neighborhood

I'm so proud!

I hope our neighbors haven't called the insane asylum for a direct admit!

Jealous

This morning when I was checking my email, I had a few updated blogs I also needed to check. One was my friend Kara's. Here is what she had to say in this particular post, "I am always quite impressed with Mr. Guidinger's ability to jump and kick. He truly could show up the Rockette's with his ability to do high kicks. Our favorite is when he kicks up and can touch the top of the door frame! Tonight he was on a roll with showing us how high he could jump and nearly hit his head on the ceiling! This, of course, had the girls all wound up to give it their best shot! We finally had to have them do it on the couch because I thought they may break their backs when they couldn't land on their feet!"

I nearly fell out of my chair when I saw the picture she had posted to go with it. Who ever said, "White men can't jump?"



I fowarded the blog post to Scott at work and then went about my day. This evening when he came home from work one of the first things he said was, "Man, I have to say I was impressed with how high Guy can jump!" I had to laugh because I hadn't thought about it the rest of the day. Scott, on the other hand, is trying to come up with something that can top the jump..............................................

and the fish eyes.

I hope you don't mind my borrowing pictures from your blog Kara, but they are great and Scott is jealous. He wants me to take a video of one of his "signature moves", but we're going to have to attempt it tomorrow, as there isn't enough space in the house. It will give all of my readers something to look forward to.

Silence

I have heard nothing but silence from Creative Memories since I sent my last email asking for a "real" reason as to why they can't imprint my albums. I'm guessing that's because there is no "real" reason. If I had a better place to get albums, I'd divorce CM over this. I did, however, get an email from another company that I emailed yesterday. They say that they were in business before CM's Persona Imprinting and that they are better than Persona. I guess I'm going to have to give them a try. The samples I have seen on their web-site look pretty comparable. The company is called Goldstamp Custom Albums. I'll let you know how they turn out. They are also less expensive.

Today was a busy day in the library at school. We had several classes come in to check out books since they missed their regular library day with the guest speaker. Today was also the Kindergartener's library day at Corpus Christi. They were VERY WILD today and I was glad when the last class was done at 3pm!

Despite getting to bed about an hour earlier than normal last night, and waking up 1 minute prior to my alarm clock going off, I'm tired today. I think all of those kids just wore me out today.

We are having a very blustery evening. The wind has picked up and the temperature is dropping. I think we are supposed to have high temps of 0 or below zero this weekend. I guess it will be a good weekend to stay inside and do some more organizing. I still haven't gotten pictures posted of my new scrapbooking area because I'm still working on it. Sorry Kysa! Maybe this weekend?

Creative Memories

As you all know, I love scrapbooking. I am very proud of the albums I have made and hope that the kids will truly appreciate all of the work and love I have put into them. I know they will. They love looking at their albums. The other night when our friend was here, we turned on Wii bowling and I asked Gage if he remembered the first time he ever went bowling. He said he didn't. I proceeded to tell him that the first time he rolled the ball down the alley, he cried and cried because he didn't think he would get the ball back. Scott said he didn't remember that. So, I went upstairs to get the album that this scrapbook page is in. It is such a precious page and the photo of Gage with his face all wrinkled up and crying is priceless. He got a big kick out of it and Scott thought it was pretty cute. I was thinking how lucky I was to have had the camera with me and that I caught that moment on film.

A few years back I learned about Creative Memories offering a new service. Persona Imprinting. They imprint the cover and spine of your albums to personalize them even more. I fell in love with it. Unfortunately, it is spendy. To imprint the spine and cover costs a little more than just the album did to begin with, but when you get them back and see how beautiful it is, it is worth every penny.

I have been working on getting all of my albums imprinted for quite awhile now. I send in a couple at a time, when we can afford it. I have a total of 11 albums imprinted. I think almost all of Emma's are imprinted and not long ago, I started on Gage's albums. I have his first album, which is his white leather album imprinted and his Preschool album imprinted. I have been dragging my feet on his albums for quite awhile because 4 of his albums are from a retired set of albums that were called scenic albums. I LOVE these album colors. Because they are retired, Creative Memories has had a disclaimer on their site that you have to check that you understand, because if something were to happen to your album, they would have to replace it with a new album that is as near to the color as possible. There haven't been any colors that could match these albums if something were to happen. However, I REALLY wanted them imprinted. I decided in late November or December that I was going to bite the bullet and send one in to see how it would turn out. At this time I sent Emma's Daisy Scout Album in along with Gage's "scenic album". When I got them back I was SO HAPPY with the results. At this time I decided I was going to send the rest of them in and yesterday, since I had the afternoon off, I decided to get that done. When I went onto the CM website and the persona imprinting link, I noticed that the scenic album colors were no longer listed in the "retired albums that we accept" list. I'm thinking, "WHAT?" I found their phone number and immediately called them up. The lady confirmed that that is true, they are no longer accepting these albums. I explained to her that I just sent one in last month to have it imprinted and it was the 1st in a series of 4 albums. She apologized and said there was nothing she could do. I was devastated to say the least. I must admit that I even cried. If I had known this was going to happen, I would have sent all 4 of them in together, OR I wouldn't have sent any of them at all. I decided to find their email address and send an email.

This is Gage's "scenic album" that I had imprinted. The color here doesn't do it justice, but it is a meadow green color.

Here are the email exchanges.

(Me)
To Whom It May Concern:

I recently sent in an album to be imprinted, that had been retired for some time. The album was from the scenic series and the color I had imprinted was Meadow. I have had over 10 albums imprinted and have been completely satisfied with the results. I was just online on the Persona web-site, preparing to have my 3 remaining albums from the scenic series (Canyon, Sand and Brook) imprinted and I am no longer able to locate these retired colors in the list of albums. Can you please let me know what I need to do to order to get these 3 remaining albums imprinted.

Thank you so much for your time.

(Them)

Good evening Stacy,

I'm so happy to hear how pleased you are with your Persona Imprinting orders. Unfortunately, we no longer accept the albums you mentioned for this service. This decision went into effect on December 1, 2008. I truly apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.Thank you for taking the time to contact us and please feel free to do so in the future.Enjoy your day!

Marie M.

Consultant Services

(Me)

Dear Mary,

I sure wish I would have known this was going to happen. There was nothing posted on the web-site regarding this decision to no longer accept these albums for imprinting. Had I known, I would have sent all of them in at the same time, or none of them at all. I'm sure this seems like some trivial little matter that I should just "get over", but I have ruined my album set by having one imprinted and am unable to imprint the remaining three. Is there any way possible, that I can get these 3 albums imprinted? I will sign a waiver or whatever it takes. If there is someone else I need to talk to regarding this matter, please let me know. I'm desperate.

Sincerely,

Stacy Stephens

(Them)

Good morning Stacy,

I do understand your concern and frustration regarding this matter. It is certainly not trivial. Unfortunately, we are not able to make any exceptions for you; I even pleaded your case to my supervisor to no avail. Again, I truly apologize for the inconvenience.Thank you for taking the time to contact us and please feel free to do so in the future.Enjoy your day!

Marie M.

Consultant Services

(Me)

Mary,

I don't understand why an exception cannot be made? Isn't this MY risk to make? There was nothing posted on the web-site regarding this decision to no longer accept these albums. As I said before, if there had been a note regarding this decision on the web-site, I would have sent all 4 albums in at the same time, or not at all. It might be a good idea to send out mass emails to your return customers of these decisions so they can make informed ones regarding their albums. It's unfortunate and I cannot even express how sad this makes me. Not that it matters to anyone, but it brought tears to my eyes. All I guess I can say is that I'm sorry I ever started imprinting my albums since all of my completed albums are imprinted (11) and no one will make any exceptions to allow my remaining 3 to be imprinted. I will certainly let everyone I know of the risk they will be taking if they choose to start imprinting any of their albums.

Stacy Stephens

Crap! While I was copying and pasting these emails to my blog, I just realized I called her Mary and her name was Marie......................maybe that's where I screwed up?

(Them)

Hello Stacy,

We apologize for your frustration. This date of the discontinuation was indeed noted to the Consultants in their Scraps Magazines back in May. We apologize this was not communicated better to the customers but we are not able to make any exceptions. If the design of your choice or a particular size of album is not on the albums to be accepted list, we are unable to make any exceptions as of 12/31/2008. Creative Memories has now reconfigured the computer hardware that links to the machines therefore we are unable to switch back to the former designs. If we switched backwards this would be too timely and expensive.We again apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. We hope that you are willing to choose another design. If you have any further questions or concerns please feel free to contact us at 1-888-227-6748 and one of our helpful Consultant Service Representatives will be more than happy to assist you.

Thank you and have a wonderful day!

Sincerely,

Tricia V.

Consultant Services

After this email, I saw, perhaps, a glimmer of hope! Afterall, it's not the design I'm having problems with, it's the simple fact that they won't allow me to put a design on these remaining albums. I decided I would call the number and explained the whole story, once again, to another person. When I mentioned the names of the colors of these albums, she abruptly said they were not imprinting these albums and longer. I think maybe the whole department knows my name now. When she said this, I just busted out crying. I think she probably was thinking I am a lunatic. I got nowhere with this and decided to send Tricia an email.

(Me)

Tricia, (At least I got the name right this time!)

It is not the album design I'm concerned about. I understand that the designs change and I use a different design each time I have an album imprinted anyway. I have been imprinting all of my albums and just started working on my son's albums because I have all of my daughter's albums imprinted. I sent in his 12x12 Meadow album (from the retired scenic series) in December and had it imprinted. My plan was to get the remaining albums in this series imprinted and now I am no longer allowed to do this. I was not made aware of this decision by any consultant, and it was not posted on the web-site. There are still retired 12x12 albums being accepted for imprinting, so I don't understand why the color of my albums would have anything to do with reconfiguring computer hardware?

Stacy Stephens

(Them)

Hi Stacy,

Thank you for contacting us back. Again I apologize that we are no longer accepting all of the retired albums for imprinting at this time. The only albums we are accepting are the ones listed on the Persona site.If there is anything else I can help you with, please let me know.

Sincerely,

Sharon L.

Consultant Services

(Me)

I would just like a real explanation of why these albums cannot be imprinted.

Stacy Stephens

I have not yet heard back from this email. They have been very good and quick about responding, so my prayer is that they have gone to a higher leveled person to help me out. In the meantime, I have been looking for websites of other companies that offer album imprinting. I have found a few, but haven't done much with it until I decide I have exhausted all my options with Creative Memories. I know that if I have the album imprinted with another company it will void all guarantees and warranties on my album.

I'm sure most of you (the non-scrapbooking, non-anal retentive readers) think this is silly and I should just get over it. The few of you who are anal scrapbookers, probably know where I'm coming from. I am an ALL OR NONE kind of person. I either want it ALL or I want NONE. I am not going to settle with ONE! I don't know where this is all going to lead to, but if I have to get Rhonda Anderson, one of the Creative Memories co-founders involved, I will! I probably should start googling her name and see if I can find out how to contact her. I'm not ready to give up yet.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I should do in regards to this problem?

A Historical Day

I am excited to see the change our new President is going to make. However, I'm already tired of watching it on television! :-)

I worked at the library for 3 hours this morning and then came home to get some things done at home. I did a little work in the basement, and the play area is at least cleared out of my junk, so the kids can play if they choose. Now that it's cleared out, they probably won't want to.

We have had a few nice days of weather, but they are predicting that tomorrow will be the last "nice day" for awhile. We will again be entering the deep freeze. If that will make Brie want to stay inside instead of ringing her bell 100 times a day to go outside, I say bring it on! I hate spring. I hate the melting of snow and the mud and slush that comes with it. I wish we could just go from winter to summer without that in between mess. I guess I don't have to worry about it for a few more days anyway.

Emma brought home an invitation in her backpack today to a birthday party. A friend of hers is having a party on Feb 7 and it said that this will also be a slumber party for the girls who would like to stay. I chose not to read that part of the invitation to Emma, at least not until I talked about it with Scott. When he came home from work, he noticed the invitation on the counter and started reading it, but I did get him stopped before he got to that part and told him not to mention that part quite yet. I'm not sure Emma is old enough for a slumber party? It's not that I don't trust the parents, but I'm not sure she will be able to stay the entire night. I would hate for her to decide at midnight or later that she was scared and wanted to come home. Not only because it would be a pain in the rump, but also because there's a possibility for getting teased about it. I'm sure that if kids tease her about wearing a ski/face mask for a stocking hat, being a "fraidy pants" and not being able to stay over night the entire night wouldn't be good for the teasing department. Later, Gage found the invitation and read it out loud while Emma was standing right there. AARGH! Her eyes got very big and she was VERY excited about this being a slumber party. I told her that she must not get too excited quite yet, because I wasn't sure that she was going to be able to go to that part of the party. I told Emma that she was going to have to prove to me that she was a big girl in the next couple of weeks and not give me ANY troubles at bedtime. Tonight after she was laying in bed and after we had read to them both, Emma asked me to come into her room. She asked me, "Mom, how do I go to sleep?" I have explained this to her MANY, MANY times. I told her that she needs to just close her eyes and shut her brain off. She asks, "How do I shut my brain off?" She's asking me, her mother who also has problems with insomnia, how to shut her brain off. I told her I wasn't sure, but sometimes I try counting sheep, or just repeating the word "sleep" over and over and over. This doesn't always work for me; however. All I know is that I have some major bargaining power for the next couple of weeks and I should be able to get Emma to do whatever I want by holding this little slumber party over her head. What are your thoughts about a 5/6 year old slumber party? I do know one thing, Emma is NOT having a slumber party for her birthday that is coming right up!

Day off

Today we had the day off of school, to celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. day. Our guest left early this morning and Scott was out of the house fairly early as well. I woke up a few times and it was quiet in the house, so I closed my eyes and went back to sleep. The kids let me sleep in this morning until 9:30!!! It's been quite awhile since I've been able to do that! It was kind of nice!

Gage and Emma had a pretty good day today. They played very well together when they were playing Rockband on the Wii. Of course Mom had to join in the fun. :-) I'm sure when they get older, Gage and Emma are going to think I'm a totally cool Mom, or a completely lame Mom. It's probably going to be the latter. LOL!

We picked Scott up for lunch and ate drive-thru McDonald's while we drove him to the Toyota dealership to pick up his truck. From there the kids and I went to Barnes and Noble. Of course we found a bunch of books we liked, so the kids used some of their B&N gift cards and I had a coupon that I got in an email. I bought the 3rd book in the Twilight series since I only have a couple of chapters left in book 2. I was sad to discover that they don't have the 3rd book out in paperback yet. I'm glad I had the extra coupon to use.

We came home and Gage spent quite awhile reading one of his new books. We started a Netflix movie we had and didn't quite get it finished before we had to head out for gymnastics. I really wanted to skip gymnastics because I hate having back-to-back activities and right after gymnastics tonight we had a Pack meeting which consisted of sledding. Of course it was completely disorganized (AS ALWAYS!) and didn't get started until nearly 7pm. Who in the world would schedule a sledding event at 6:30pm on a school night during the winter when it gets dark at 5p? I kept my mouth shut; however, because I know if I get going on it I'll end up finding myself with more responsibilities and I certainly don't need that!

I had volleyball tonight at 9:30, so it's been quite a busy day. I'm glad school is back in session tomorrow. They have some sort of speaker in the library tomorrow and Wednesday, so I only have to go in to shelve books if needed tomorrow and I have Wednesday off. I hope to get some work done in the basement since I didn't do a single thing down here today. I'm sure I'll end up finding something better to do! I always do!

No school tomorrow

There is no school here tomorrow due to Martin Luther King Jr. day. The kids are excited about having the day off. That's another nice thing about working at the school, I get the day off with the kids!

We cleaned like crazy today and finally got it completed not too long before our guest arrived. Gage and Emma were sure excited to have someone different here to show their things to. Mike is an outdoor/wildlife photographer from Lincoln, NE and is on his way back home from a photo shoot in Montana. He had some awesome pictures of antelope.

My day tomorrow will be spent in the basement trying to clean up the mess I made from cleaning out the guest room. Since Tuesday is garbage day, I think I may just fill up the trash can.

Gage and Emma have gymnastics tomorrow evening, along with a sledding party/Pack meeting after that. I also have volleyball on Monday nights, so we have a pretty full schedule, despite having no school.

Good night and have a great week!

Wine or whine?

This evening we were invited to a wine tasting party. Hmmm...........great thing to be invited to since neither one of us drink wine! Needless to say, I whined a little about going. On my little card, I had numbered 1-15 and here is how it went.
1. Sucked.
2. Sucked even more.
3. YUCK!
4. Terrible!
5. More terrible than the one before.
6. Horrible!
7. How much more of this can I take?
8. Disgusting.
9. Not too terrible.
10. Not bad.
11. yuck!
12. Not good.
13. Ewwww!
14. Hey, this isn't too bad.
15. Gross!

It was quite funny because most of the people were complaining about #14 tasting like cherry couch syrup. I suppose it makes sense, that I liked it, because I don't think cherry NyQuil tastes all that bad. We didn't stay too long because the kids were at our friend, Laura and Steve's, house.

The house is in terrible shape. I worked really hard today to get the guest room cleaned out. I emptied out the entire closet and almost everything in the room (except the furniture). I had to go through all of Gage's paperwork from his 1st grade year. I didn't throw a single worksheet, or artwork away and I was sure regretting that. I take pictures of all the artwork to put into his scrapbook and I had been putting it off for a year and decided to get that project done. I did finish it, and felt a huge sense of accomplishment after that. Gage and Emma were busy all day playing and messing up the living room and when Gage had gone upstairs to go to the bathroom he noticed the guest room was totally nice and organized and clean. He came downstairs and asked, "Do we have someone coming to stay with us?" Ha ha! It's bad when you're kids know someone is coming only because I start cleaning like a madwoman! I got that room finished and came downstairs to see that the main floor was a complete wreck. I guess I'll be working on that tomorrow! No school on Monday means I'll have to spend that day off in the basement, because all the crap that was in the guest room is now in the basement. Our crap just gets moved from one place to the other. I need to throw it out instead!

Heat wave!

It was 36 degrees here today! It was -44 degrees below zero yesterday. Ah, that's what living in North Dakota is all about. Everyone is freaking out about snow melting this weekend and causing some flooding into window wells and basements. Today at the library, Mrs. Schmidt cleared out all of the books in 2 bookshelves just underneath the only window (a basement window) in case the snow melts enough to cause flooding in the window well, as she doesn't want to sacrifice any books. When we got home from school, our neighbor Dave was snowblowing all of the snow that has accumulated around his house. He has about a 3 foot wide path around his entire house that has been removed of snow. What have we done? Nothing. Maybe I should start praying for subzero temps so we don't have to worry about the melting snow flooding our basement?

The kids complained more today on our walk home because they were hot and sweaty than they do on the cold days. In fact, they had their coats unzipped and their snowpants unzipped by the time we arrived home.

I've spent my evening and night getting my scrapbooking stuff organized. It's looking pretty good, but it's in the basement and now I'm worried about it getting flooded! I'll try to finish it up tomorrow and take a picture or two.

Records

We are setting records here in the frigid north! This morning we set a record at -44 degrees and that is the temperature people, not the wind chill!! The all time coldest temp ever is -45, so we weren't far off from breaking that one as well. I'm sure you will all be relieved to know that Scott drove us to school this morning! :-) You can stop worrying Mom!

It was another fine day at work. I had another sub helping me at Corpus Christi this afternoon, which made that a much more manageable afternoon!

It's hard to have much to talk about when I spend the day at work.

One exciting thing that happened today........................I got a new labelmaker! Yes Kysa and Kara, I am joining the land of the organized! Scott's afraid he's going to come home from work tomorrow to see that I have labeled the entire house! :-) I don't think I have enough label tape to do that, so no need to worry Scott! I can't wait to get my new scrapping area labeled! I'm going to be so organized I won't know what to do! HA! Yes, that is sarcasm!

We're supposed to warm up tomorrow. It's going to be a scorching 30 degrees (above zero)! Everyone will be dragging out their summer clothes if that keeps up!

Day off

I had the day off today. I spent it doing laundry and moving my scrapbooking area to the basement versus having it in the guest room. Scott says we may have a guest over this weekend and I thought it might be a good idea to get that room cleaned up, then decided to move my scrapbook stuff out altogether. I think I made at least 20 trips up and down 3 flights of stairs, so my legs should have had a good workout! I think I'm going to like it in the basement, and I can't wait to get it organized to try it out!

The kids got lucky this morning and Scott gave them a ride to school. I guess he felt sorry for them after he read my blog last night. Tomorrow is the morning they need the ride, however, I will be working and because I'm back and forth between Northridge and Corpus, having a car is kind of silly. It would end up being wherever I'm not. We'll tough it out and walk. It's -24 degrees right now, so I hate to see what it's going to be in the morning! They are calling for -33 degrees tomorrow morning!

Our weatherman, Too Tall Tom, says we have had 61.2 inches of snow so far and only need 40.5 more inches to break the all time snowiest winter on record! I know we can do it! Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Maybe I'll have more to say tomorrow?

The Snow Fairy

Yesterday evening Scott and I were talking a little bit about the snow. He commented that we hardly had any snow drift in our driveway yesterday, and he said he couldn't figure out why our neighbor, Dave, had alot of drifted snow in his driveway and we didn't. His thoughts were, "SCORE!" I was sure to let him know that the snow fairy (a.k.a. ME) magically came and removed all of our drifted snow. He almost didn't believe me! HELLO! I think Scott thought that we were the only people on our street that didn't get snow!

We got tons more snow today! I think they said on the news that we have 6 feet of snow now. Today was the first morning that Gage REALLY complained about walking to school. It was an ugly walk and Emma was about to start crying when we finally got to her school (a whole block away!). I told her she needs to wear the face mask/stocking hat I bought, but she says the kids make fun of her and act like they are scared of her when she wears it. I guess maybe she'll change her mind if we continue to have this cold, blowing snow!

I wanted to take some pictures of the snow we have in our front yard. I talked to Emily on the phone the other night and told her that our snow was as high as the railing to our front steps and she couldn't believe it. Here's proof for you Emily!

Gage is standing on top of our snow mountain this past Saturday while outside playing with Emma and Grant. You can see just how high it is if you compare how high Gage is in comparison to the back of Scott's truck and the houses across the street!

Tonight while Scott was outside removing snow from the driveway (with the help of Dave's snowblower!) I had him snap a few pictures of the kids sledding down our snow mountain. I have never seen this much snow in my life!!!

You should be able to understand now why I'm complaining about being unable to shovel the snow because I can't throw it high enough to get it over the mountain on either side of the driveway!

These will be great pictures for the kids' scrapbooks so they can look back and see just how much snow we got this year!!!

I love the snow, but I must admit it's wearing me out! Walking to and from school on unshoveled sidewalks is quite a chore. I hate to start the car up to drive it 2 blocks though! And, with as terribly congested as it is around the school in the mornings and afternoons, it is safer for us to walk. There are some people who just think that the rules no longer apply when the snow is covering the crosswalks and the painted handicap spots. It was CRAZY outside the school at 3pm today and the crossing guard finally got after this man who was trying to park just in front of the crosswalk, behind the sign that says, "NO PARKING FROM HERE TO CORNER". I wonder what part of that sign didn't he understand?

I'm looking forward to getting a few things done around the house tomorrow since another sub will be working in the library tomorrow.

Mondays

I guess now that I can like Fridays and weekends, due to working, I can legitimately hate Mondays! :-) Our Monday didn't start well today.

This morning Scott came in and woke me up saying he didn't know why the alarm clock didn't go off, but that it was 7:30. I popped straight out of bed so I could start getting everyone ready for school. At this point, I still didn't know if I was working today or not. I went into the bathroom to wet my hair down..............it's never a good idea to go to bed with a wet head the night before! When I went back into the bedroom, I was trying to figure out why the dumb alarm clock didn't go off. I had already chewed Scott out for messing it up, because I had set it (correctly) when I went to bed, and when he came to bed he was messing around with it. Anyway, I discovered that it was actually set to go off at 7am. Scott had gotten up earlier to let Brie outside and had come back to bed thinking it was 6:50, and he could sleep a little bit longer. When he woke up again, he noticed it was 30 minutes past the hour, thinking the hour was 7am, but it was actually 6am!!! UGH! When I was checking the clock over to see why it didn't go off, I discovered it was because the actual time was 6:40 not 7:40! AARGH! I guess it's better to get up too early, than too late, however, when you're awakened too early when you actually think it's too late, it doesn't make the morning start any smoother. I don't even know if that makes any sense or not? The kids had already eaten their breakfast when I came downstairs and then I got all of their stuff organized to go to school. Since I had time, I decided I would go outside and shovel snow. I was sweating my butt off before I finished. There was ALOT of drifted snow and I seriously cannot throw the snow over the mountain that has been created along the side of the driveway anymore. The wind was blowing hard enough that all I really had to do was launch the snow from the shovel up in the air and the wind would wisk it away. It was soon time for us to head to school, and a GOOD MOM would have driven their kids to school, but this MEAN MOM made them walk. Actually, they don't even ask anymore if we can drive. It's just known that we are going to walk, and if we do happen to drive, it's a pleasant surprise (which happens very rarely!) Anyway, we had to walk through some pretty deep drifts down our sidewalk until I discovered it would be easier to just walk in the streets, where the snow had already been driven through. When we dropped Emma off, they were staying inside because of the nasty windchills, so we went in and I took her snowman project up to her classroom and had her take her stuff off and hang it on her hook. On our way up the stairs she asked if she could go eat breakfast in the lunchroom. I said, "Emma, you already ate breakfast." She replies, "No I didn't!" I didn't actually see the kids eat breakfast, so I wasn't sure if they did or not. I asked Gage if he ate and he said he did, but he didn't know if Emma did or not. I felt horrible thinking she may not have gotten breakfast, but she isn't in the breakfast program at school, so I told her she would have to last until lunchtime. They eat at 11am, so it's not a terrible long wait. I went on to school with Gage and as soon as we got inside the school, an alarm went off. I asked Gage what the alarm was and he said it was the fire alarm. I asked him what they are supposed to do when the fire alarm goes off, and he said go outside. So, we went outside to stand. Not long after that someone came out and told us we were meeting in the gym since it was so cold outside. There have been electricians working in the computer lab, and I think the alarms were accidentally set off. I took Gage into the gym and stood awhile, because I thought if there was a real fire, I wanted to be sure to get him out of there and take him home. I saw Mrs. Schmidt in the meantime and casually asked her if she needed me to work in the library. She replies, "YES!" I'm thinking, "Oh CRAP! I'm not even ready!" She told me that she was in the process of calling me on Friday evening to tell me she needed me to work this morning, but got interrupted and then forgot that she hadn't actually called me until this morning. I told her in a bit of a panic that I would have to go home to change clothes since I was in my sweats! UGH! I made sure the alarm wasn't due to a real fire, then took off for home to get my clothes changed to head back to school. Thankfully, the remainder of the day wasn't quite as bad. I used to love Mondays, but not anymore! :-)

Oh, and in case you're still feeling terrible about poor little Emma who didn't get breakfast? Well, she did get breakfast! Scott was still at home in bed when I got back to get ready to go back to work in the library, because he said he wasn't feeling well, and I asked him if Emma had eaten. He had fried her an egg. I felt much better after hearing that. She has come home from school before telling me she was hungry at school because she didn't get breakfast. I know better most days because I am the one who makes her breakfast. What a little turkey! She just wanted to eat breakfast at the school too!

I'm still not feeling the best here, but I did manage to make it to the grocery store so we would have something to eat. Scott seems to be doing better as he is out visiting a friend at the present time. It's amazing how he can bounce back from near-death!

We are getting more snow and they are calling for blizzard-like conditions tonight. It looks like it could be getting started when I take a glance out the window.

Not sure what my work week is looking like yet. I guess sometimes it's best to not know until the last minute, that way I don't spend too much time worrying about it. Although, maybe I spend more time worrying about not knowing?

I'm going to see if a bath might help me feel a little better.

Sorry ahead of time

I'm apologizing now for my short post. Here's our day in a nutshell.

Scott is on his death bed.
Gage was perhaps more difficult to deal with today than Emma.
I'm starting to feel quite crappy and despite my overwhelming urge to sleep, I can't put my new book down. I went out and bought the book "Twilight" last week and it is so good I don't want to stop reading. I'm kind of mad at myself though, because I read 7 chapters in the 4th book of the series (thinking it was the 1st book) and I know what is going to happen. I hate knowing. I like the suspense. Emily, I don't know why you like to know how a book ends before you start reading it? That just doesn't make any sense!? :-) Despite knowing that detail, it is still very good and I can't wait to find out what happens up to that point!

I hope to feel better tomorrow.

TGIF!!!

I'm not even sure of a topic that can even come close to topping the underwear? I think I really liked this idea "I might suggest to Anonymous's underwear problem....if you are frustrated enough AND he does wear thong underwear, possibly consider giving them to him to use as dental floss before you wash them. You may feel more satisfied about them being more "used" and he can get a taste of his S@*T!!!!!:) Hang in there!! Part of Anonymous' support team!" I can't even beat that one, so I won't even try!

TGIF!!! I think maybe I will like Fridays more and fully appreciate lazy weekends now, being a "working Mom". However, I must say this isn't going to be much of a fun, or lazy weekend because Scott came home sick from work today. He slept all afternoon and thought he felt well enough for DU's Christmas party tonight. We left pretty early because he wasn't feeling well. He wanted me to feel his head on the way home to see if he had a temperature. He did, according to the lip-to-the-forehead test. He's usually close to death when he is sick, so we'll be in mourning around here.

Another way I can tell it's not going to be much fun tomorrow is because Emma is still awake, sobbing, in her bedroom (9:50pm). Gage has his friend, Grant, sleeping over tonight and Emma is completely ticked off that she can't sleep in Gage's room with them. I don't know why she even wants to? I think it's because they are sleeping on the floor and for whatever reason, it seems to be a novelty. I would much rather sleep in my warm, comfortable bed, versus the cold, hard floor. She's going to be a bear tomorrow. Between her being a grouch and Scott being sick, I may have to go find a place to hideout tomorrow! Maybe I could go outside and dig me out a snow cave?

The snow we had, yesterday thru today, sure is pretty. It is so nice and white. Let me tell you though, it was NOT FUN trying to find a place to put it! I shoveled before I went to school this morning and I seriously can hardly throw it up high enough to get it on top of the mountain of snow on either side of the driveway. Thankfully neighbor Dave came to the rescue with his snowblower after he got off work . It was kind of funny, as it seems that everyone right around him came outside to do some snow removal, or at least make it look that way, hoping he would come over with his snowblower and get rid of it. It was almost like back in my elementary P.E. days when they were picking teams for a game of dodgeball and everyone is like, "Oh, oh! Pick me! Pick me! Me first!" I was doing the same thing. I felt bad; however, when I had to finally go inside to get ready to go to the DU Christmas party, because I didn't want to just get my drive cleaned up and then run. I tried my hardest to get out of going to the dumb party to begin with, since they were making everyone pay for their own meals this year. I felt bad driving away while Dave was outside still blowing snow from his driveway after finishing up everyone else's.

I'll do my best to come up with something interesting tomorrow!

The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

It seems that the underwear topic is quite popular! I think I am going to have to come up with some more interesting posts like that to keep things from getting boring! :-)

This morning I had a phone call from Mrs. Schmidt, and it seems that she caught the stomach flu that her son had on Monday. I was already planning to go in to work for Mrs. Hocking, as she was, and is going to be, out for awhile. Mrs. Schmidt said that she was unable to find a sub, which meant that I was by myself!! I assured Mrs. Schmidt that I could do it, and that it wasn't necessary to cancel the Kindergarteners' library day. The more I thought about it all, the more worried I was becoming, and I thought maybe I might need to stay home with the stomach flu too, with the way it was churning. I decided I needed to put things in perspective. I have been in many situations worse than this one, when I was working as a nurse, when people's lives were at stake. I felt a little better knowing that these were just books! I can't screw it up too bad, can I? I had one of the other ladies who works in the library during the first hour of the morning give me the low down on how to start up the computers and log onto the system. I took some notes and she told me if I needed anything, to call her on her cell phone. She was working at Corpus Christi first thing this morning getting all of the books checked in for the Kindergarteners' library time. I seemed to be a little less nervous once I got the computers up and running, and I found a stack of books on the desk with a note to check them out to Lexie. Hmmm.....................I wonder who Lexie is?? I thought I would give Mrs. Buechler a call, since she said I could, and ask her. It seems I should have also gotten a little training on how to use the phone! I couldn't figure out how to call out. I tried dialing 9, then the number. It didn't work. I tried 1 and the number and that didn't work either. I also tried just dialing the number without any luck. I decided that I would try and do a search on the computer, and since there was only 1 Lexie in the system, I knew it had to be her. It turned out to be correct. One problem solved! I had one 1st grade class that came in for story time and to check out books while I was at Northridge, and then after lunch, I went to Corpus Christi for 5 classes of Kindergarteners. I decided to read them the same story I read to the 1st graders, because it just kind of fit. It was called Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. After 6 times, I started to get pretty good at it! ;-) The kids enjoyed the book and it really wasn't quite that terrible! The kids were quite noisy, but for the most part, I think I kept them all in line. I'll be working again tomorrow, and as far as I know, Mrs. Schmidt will be there too. I'm praying she is anyway. Even a few of the Kindergartener's said, "You mean you're here all by yourself?" I told them to take it easy on me.

We had our Daisy Scout meeting right after school so I put in several hours at the school today! Unfortunately for me, Emma didn't behave at Girl Scouts like she did during library time. She confessed at suppertime it was because at school there is a principal, and she doesn't want to be sent to see him. I'm going to have to let her know that he is still in the building and she can still be sent to him, just to straighten her up a little bit.

We're having quite a bit of snow again. It was actually kind of pretty when I had the chance to see it out the window. Apparently the grocery stores were flooded with people stocking up in case it turned into a bad storm. I'm glad I wasn't there to experience it!

This post wasn't nearly as much fun as the underwear. You're going to have to come up with something else tomorrow Anonymous #2! I did enjoy Anonymous #5's comment about the type of underwear he may be wearing! I believe that Anonymous #3 was right on target suggesting he's a head case. Oh, and I was also quite disturbed to hear that Scott says 1 pair of underwear can last him a week during the hunting season. EEEWWWWW! Now there's another reason for me to hate the hunting season!! As for the new question about what product to use on the skid marks, I think since he has 49 pair, you're probably safe in throwing them away!?

Underwear

I don't know how many of you go through and read the comments on my blog, but I had several comments posted today, anonymously. I'm sure my family and friends, and maybe even frequent readers will know who it is. Anyway, she asked me to post a question on my blog, so I am going to take a poll. Here is her question(s):

Comment #1 - "Well...I just want you to post a question on your blog...Please ask your readers if they have ever been chewed out because their husband ran out of underwear - My laundry was 100% done on Sunday...Delivered to all spots in the house and today is Wednesday....How many pair of underwear does the normal house husband use in that short of a time frame?"

Comment #2 - "oh...I'm counting the ones I'm washing right now....2 are currently in the dryer... I will count the next load as they go in the dryer....Also...I went to the underwear drawer and counted how many pair of underwear were in the drawer....sit down....49...yes..no typo...49 pair of underwear that are evidently not as good as the two pair that are in the dryer....Let me voice this...I wear one pair of underwear a day...so I have two pair three pair in the laundry right at this momment...Sunday's Monday's and Tuesdays! I still have Wednesday's on!!!!"

Comment #3 - "Question...Is it possible to shove all 49 pair of underwear that are currently clean and in his drawer up his ***? "

Comment #4 - "I guess when you are a real rotten (bleep (edited by me)) you must go thru more underwear than the normal person!"

Comment #5 - "Do you suppose anyone has guessed who this is that is anonymously venting?????"

Comment #6 - "Stacy if you call me use the Cell phone cuz it is with me while I'm waiting for the laundry to finish... "

I just got a phone call from anonymous, reporting that there were 9 pair of underwear from Sunday-Wednesday in the washer. I think he must change his underwear every time he farts? It's a good thing he doesn't live in this house, because I wash clothes once a week, and he would be SOL until the following Monday!

So, how many pair of underwear does your husbands go through in a week? More importantly, I want to know how many of your husbands even own 49 pairs of underwear?

And I didn't think I had much to blog about!

Late

I am not yet back to "the old drawing board". Yesterday after I dropped Gage off at school, I walked back home to spend an hour before I went back to school to work in the library. When I got home, I went to the kitchen to fix myself a lunch to eat at school. When I got my lunch bag out, I saw Gage's snack bag. SHOOT! I forgot to send a snack to school with Gage. I thought to myself, Oh well, no big deal. I'll just take his snack and put it in his backpack when I went back to school as I had to be back to school by 9:30a. When I got back to the school I went to put Gage's snack in his backpack and saw that the front zippered part of his bag was unzipped, so I wondered if they were having snack time already? Surely they weren't already eating their snack? I put the snack bag in his backpack and continued on down to the library. After school let out, Gage came to the library to meet me before we left to go get Emma. I asked him if he got his snack and he said no. I immediately felt terrible. I told him I brought his snack when I came back to school and thought he would find it. Well, they had already had their snack. I asked him if anyone else didn't have a snack and he said no. I don't know why it would make me feel any better knowing that Gage AND a classmate didn't have a snack? I asked Gage if he was hungry at snack time, and of course he replied, "Yes." I didn't forget his snack today, needless to say!

Today I worked in the library from 1-3p. The time flew by very quickly. I didn't even realize it was 3p until the janitor lady came into the library and Mrs. Schmidt's daughter came in. I had asked Gage to meet me in the library again, so I was waiting for him. It took him awhile to show up. He had forgotten he was supposed to meet me in the library until he arrived at out meeting spot outside and discovered I wasn't there. After he came down to the library, we had to go back to his classroom because he had forgotten his library books in his desk. We went there, then I had to drop a couple of things off at the office and sign out. I told Gage we needed to hurry because I knew we were running a little late in picking Emma up. We walked as quickly as we could and when we finally arrived at Corpus Christi to pick Emma up, just inside the doorway stood Emma, her teacher, another teacher and the principal. Emma came running to me and I apologized for being late. The principal commented, "See, I told you she would be coming." Emma was the only kid left in the school (besides the teacher's daughter). She thought I wasn't coming to get her. I apologized to her teacher a few different times. She said it wasn't a problem as she knew I would be coming. I am certainly not going to win the "Mother-of-the-Week" award this week let me tell you! I hate being late. I'll do better tomorrow. (I hope!)

I get the opportunity to work again tomorrow at 9:30 instead of in the afternoon. I can't wait to see that next paycheck! However, I feel bad that Juanita's back is causing her to miss work. I do hope she gets to feeling better soon.

Pet Hair

I have a few different blogs that I read where they list different products that they either love or hate. I haven't felt the need to do that, until now. There are a few different products that I cannot live without and wish that I had invented. The Swiffer is one of them. I couldn't live without a swiffer.

The other day Scott came home from Walmart with a new product. I have never seen it advertised on television and had never heard of this product prior to Scott bringing it home. My new favorite product is the Pledge Fabric Sweeper for pet hair. This truly is an AMAZING product, and anyone with pets MUST own this! Scott bought it and brought it home the other day because our little yellow cat, Griz, pulls his hair out and there was hair all over the couch. I wasn't paying any attention when Scott used it the other day and when I asked him if it worked, he said it did. He didn't tell me how WELL it worked! Tonight when I got home from my volleyball game, I noticed that Griz had been busy pulling more hair out, which was all over the couch, so I thought I would get this little sweeper thing out and give it a try. OMG! It's the MOST AWESOME thing EVER! It picked up the cat hair like nothing I have ever seen before! It was better than a lint brush and better than a roll of packing tape, no kidding! I want to go out and buy one for everyone I know with a cat. I had to call my Mom and sister tonight to tell them about it. It was hard to describe, so I thought I would just blog about it, and add a couple of pictures so they could visualize it. I also found the link, so just click on the link above and check this bad boy out! Seriously, if you have a cat, you MUST go out and buy this ASAP!

This morning I had a phone call from the librarian at school asking me if I could come in at 9:30 and work til 3, instead of from 1-3p. Her son was up all night with a stomach bug and she wasn't able to go to work. I was happy that I was able to do it. I worked with Juanita until 1p, then I worked for Juanita until 3p. I was a little nervous about being in the library for a couple of hours by myself, but it went very well. I had to read a story to a 3rd grade class, which I was nervous about. I am not fond of public speaking, or public reading. I have never read to any kids except my own, but it wasn't bad at all. They had all come in from recess and their cheeks were as red as could be, and I could feel that my neck, cheeks and ears were just as red as theirs! I didn't mind it at all, and I won't be so nervous if I have to do it again. It turned out to be a pretty good day and I don't think I screwed anything up too badly in the couple of hours I was there by myself. Juanita came back around 2:30 because she was volunteering in another classroom, so I had my little stack of books with my questions ready for her. I couldn't remember what I was supposed to do with the books that were returned that came from a different library. She helped me with that and not long after that, it was time to go home. I was beat when I got home so I'm hoping to sleep well tonight! I'm looking forward to going back tomorrow afternoon!

P.S. After I published this post, I clicked on the link to see if it worked. It did. However, I didn't realize that it had a video on the link, so I clicked on it to see the video. I just wanted to add a little note here to tell you that this thing works just as good in real life as it does in the video! There is no trick videography in that little clip, and if you don't believe me, then go buy one for yourself and you will see what I am talking about. I think Scott said it was less than $5.

Busy work week!

We have a busy week ahead of us! Unfortunately my friend, Juanita, in the library, is having some back problems and is needing me to sub for her in the afternoon all week. (It's unfortunate for Juanita, but fortunate for me!) It's funny, because back when I was working in the hospitals, I dreaded going in to work, and with this job, I look forward to it. I hope your back gets to feeling better Juanita! We're thinking about you!

We made it to Target today without any big meltdowns, believe it or not. Well, I guess it's easy to believe, because Target had what both Gage and Emma were looking for (thank goodness!). I think I won't be taking them into any stores for quite awhile. They have had an awful case of the "gimmies". We're going to have to dig out our book "The Barenstain Bears Get the Gimmies" and hopefully get rid of those darned things! They are both nearly broke, so that will help.

Gage and Emma were invited over to our friends, Steve and Laura's, this afternoon to play with Alan and Ellie. They had a great time and even got to go to the Y with them and go swimming. Scott and I took advantage of not having the "gimmies" with us and ran a few errands. I think we're nearly stocked back up after our trip to Iowa. Now I just need to make it to the grocery store. I'll have to maybe check out the online grocery shopping tomorrow.

I have a volleyball game tomorrow night. The first one of this session. It will be with a different team of which I know only 1 person. I'm excited to play again. We have a Girl Scout meeting on Thursday after school, so I need to get prepared for that. We are officially into the new year of 2009, and our week is just as busy as the end of 2008. Keeping busy will keep us out of trouble.

Home, Sweet Home!

We made it home Friday evening around 6:30pm. The roads were good and no bad weather. There was some blowing snow across the interstate when we got into North Dakota and the visibility wasn't the greatest at times, but we've driven in ALOT worse conditions, so we were thankful for the travel weather we had.


I hate the mess we have when we get home from vacations. There is crap everywhere. I need to get motivated to clean it up.

Gage and Emma have Christmas money burning a hole in their pockets. We went to Walmart this evening which turned out to be a huge mistake. We had both kids ticked off and crying as they left the store empty handed. It was quite embarrassing and I was trying to stay as far ahead of them as I could while I was pushing the cart to the checkout, hoping no one would think they were mine. I don't think it worked.

It's pretty cold here. While we were in Iowa I didn't even use my coat. I wasn't outside that much though. We can't get away without wearing coats here. It is -10 degrees outside right now, with windchills much colder than that.

While we were gone we had our neighbor, Dave, checking on our animals. Unfortunately, he did a good job and they were all still alive when we got home. I told him I wouldn't be upset if he just flushed the tadpole and salamander down the toilet. The cats might clog the pipes, so that probably wouldn't be a good idea. Speaking of cats, our yellow cat, Griz, was MIA when Dave came to check on them Wed night. Thursday Maggie called me at my Mom's house asking where he might be hiding, as they had been looking for him for over an hour and couldn't find him. Griz likes to get into cupboards and drawers and just about anything else that he can find. There was no way that he could have gotten out of the house, so we weren't worried that he had escaped. On Friday when Dave came to check on them, he heard Griz howling and found him trapped inside our dresser drawers in our bedroom. None of the drawers were even open, but apparently there is an open place on the lower backside of the dresser that he crawled into, then climbed up into one of the drawers and then couldn't get out. When Scott opened his dresser drawer this morning to get his hunting clothes out for his final pheasant hunt of the season, his black clothes were COVERED in cat hair. Unfortunately Griz is very neurotic and when I'm away, he pulls his hair out, literally. You can tell on his back half that he is missing quite a bit of hair. I guess a week is too long to be gone in Grizzy's eyes! Thankfully there were no stinky surprises in Scott's drawer, even after he had been in there for a couple of days! He may have been in and out of there and then finally couldn't get out and had to cry for help. He's sitting here on my lap with his chin resting on my arm as I type. He's sticking to me like glue to make sure I don't leave him again.

It was nice sleeping in our own beds last night and I'm looking forward to school starting back up on Monday!

Happy 2009!

I have not really made any New Year's Resolutions for the new year. I thought about what I would put on that list, and it seems that continuing my "organizing" from my last year's resolution sounded like a good idea. I did pretty well at getting things organized, but I have several more things I need to get done. My sister, Kysa, suggested we list several things on small pieces of paper, then draw out of the hat each week at what is going to be organized. We each have the container with the same things listed, and we both have to do whatever it says. I thought that was a great idea, because if you turn something into some sort of contest, where I can "WIN", I'm in! :-) Anything to get me motivated!

I haven't heard how the water situation is, as to whether it can be consumed or not. Today is our last day here, so we don't have to deal with it much longer. I pray it gets resolved because what a pain in the butt! I hope it doesn't last too long guys! You can sure follow us home to Bismarck, where the water is clean! (And frozen!)

I've heard rumors that we've had quite a bit of snow in Bismarck since we left. I hope it hasn't been too bad on our neighbor, Dave. He has been watching our zoo of animals and has had several driveways to care for as well, ours being one of them. We'll be home soon Dave! Hopefully we'll have good driving weather for tomorrow! I think the kids will be so worn out that they will sleep the entire way...................or at least that's what I'm praying for!