It's Just One of THOSE Days

Everyone has them, no one likes them.

It's just one of those day. Anything and everything isn't as it should be. Plans falling through, the ladies wanted my lo mein, the tv is out, the oven was smoking, I couldn't order my bras, the children were NOT napping, and I had a horrible hankerin' for something I just couldn't put my finger on. I woke up on the wrong side of the bed and it just seemed to get worse from there. These things happen, I get it. But I don't have to like it.

DH is going to help bury his parent's dog tonight. Dead dogs aren't much fun. That means I won't be hitting the fabric store for some more fabric and zippers. It means I will be stuck with the ladies who will be cranks from lack of napitude. It also means that dinner will be fairly quick and straight forward, not as relaxed as I had hoped. I could try and make the best of things and hop in the pool but I'm sure Claire will geek out over the water and it will probably be a little chilly thanks to Mother Nature giving us the cold shoulder last night.

But I will make do.

I'm a rockstar.

A rockstar who is a having a suck day. A day that happens to be her anniversary. An anniversary in which all I can offer DH is my bad mood and sharp tongue. I guess it's a day like any other!

I Live

No really! I'm still alive. It's a miracle! I'm still alive and a little high and my marriage is intact! I do have a new love though...

Beauty! I actually love that they have "character". Character being code for imperfections, stains, and rot. Ha, yes! This old house has some rotten floor boards! But at least they are now prettier rotten boards! I love the satin finish. It won't show all the imperfections or nearly as many scratches from certain four legged creatures that inhabit this house!

More importantly I am proud of myself to pulling through and getting it done in a timely fashion. Now I have to not drop the ball and actually finish. I still have to buy, stain, poly, cut, and attach the quarter round. Sure that's only a half a day of work, but it will be a three day project waiting for stain and poly to dry! I am great at getting things pretty much done. So this time I have baited myself! New living room chairs if AFTER I finish. I set my deadline for the end of summer and after I hit publish plan on browsing a few furniture sites!! I'm even toying with the idea of building them! Sooo exciting!

So until then, I will set to reassembling the house because I'd like to find my breakfast nook at some point!

Isn't that disgusting? I have no where to store stuff so any place I could find had to do. There are dining room chairs in the basement, a buffet in the nook, and if you look closely on the left you can see the top to my dining room table! I'm not sure where the legs are at the moment... Oh and the pool supplies that couldn't be put away because this house had run out of room. Needless to say, no one will be coming over to see the floors just yet! Tomorrow is all about dusting and replacing. No more eating in the family room. The girls were thrilled to be back at home and I couldn't take another day of my parent's hospitality. I'm pretty sure I gained 15 pounds this weekend just watching my father eat.

Have you tackled any major home improvement projects? Where did you put your stuff?

I could have easily put stuff in the shed, but that would imply that I built the shed last summer like I said I was going to... I'm such a slacker! A slacker with freshly finished floors!

Guess who had a hot date with a can of stain??

This chick right here! I really know how to let it all hang out on a Friday night. I'm so excited to be finishing the floors. I can tell you that every muscle of by upper body and back aches from staining last night. EVERY MUSCLE!! But it is well worth it to have semi decent floors. These floors are so old and were in such bad condition that I really should have just replaced them but on budgets didn't quite agree. So for a total cost of 200 of DH's hard earned dollars, a week of our time and frustration, and way to much dust we now have almost finished floors! Go us!

Next up, to poly the floors a million times and let it take it's sweet ass time drying while we live out of the basement and mother's. Then maybe, just maybe, I can have something resembling a normal house again!

How your weekend is half as exciting as this!

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Sexy It Up

This is how you look sexy when refinishing floors. It's all in the mask ladies!!!

Rather than color, the native Claire E. Bear continually empties and refills her marker box. This striking and remarkable characteristic sets her apart from the other toddleristas in her pack.

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Father's Day

We had a great father's day at Catoctin! My parents tagged along and we had a great day exploring and feeding the animals. DH chose to go there to have a more family oriented and kid friendly experience, plus 7 points! The epitome of a good dad! Before we left we made sure to give him his cards. I wouldn't want him to think the whole day was about us!

The girls had a blast seeing the animals and pointing out everything they knew, and thought they knew. The award goes to my mother who thought the sounds of the lemurs were dogs. Cause lemurs bark ya know?! The girls enjoyed seeing all the fish and ducks. They were to scared to approach the ducks to feed them but they weren't to afraid of the alpacas and goats. I totally expected the princess Claire to geek out at the mere suggestion of touching dirty, dirty animals but she didn't! Poor Emma was sad to leave!

After we'd had our fill we went to track down lunch which wasn't all that easy up in the hills. But within twenty minutes we were seated and passing out snacks. We bid my parents adieu, after they paid for lunch-SCORE, and went about our day. After a trip to hell-mart, on a Sunday what was I thinking!!!!, we just existed at home. After DH let me take a quick nap I started on some chores. I installed two new electrical plugs, finished-up the floor, and cleaned up the yard a bit.

The in-laws stopped by on their way home for a visit. We exchanged some more cards and handed over a birthday invite. Then they hurried home and we hurried off for a bath before bed. I promptly fell asleep soon after. He didn't even get any. Poor guy. I feel bad it wasn't more of celebration of dad but it was a nice family day and that was all he wanted.

So Happy Father's Day DH. I hope you enjoyed it!

A Week In My Phone

Another week, another set of lazy pictures. Without my phone, there may be no record of my children's youth!

Totally not from my phone! These are the invited I made and sent out. So proud that they looked decent, and even happier about my free envelopes that I have no use for at the moment!

I took the first set in eliminating my ground rent! Hooray! Yes, I currently do not hold the land my house sits on. Prior to 2004 failing to pay your ground rent could result in the holder of the ground rent foreclosing on the house you own! Welcome to Baltimore! Apparently this doesn't really happen ANYWHERE else. Is there ground rent where you live?

Stupid neighbor and stupid county! See the dead grass?? Neighbor man is too lazy to edge so he just uses grass killer. Looks REALLY NICE! Those are his grass clippings in the street too! Soo annoying. Those red marks are more annoying though. The county is coming to mess with the lines again. After the grass as finally come back strong and the lawn has almost evened out. They have marked off the front yard AND the street. Goodbye parking. A driveway, and preferably an attached three car garage, is on the check list for the next house!

You can barely make this out but Claire has her arm around the neck of her new stuffed friend. She has taken a liking to playing with a friend. Not live friends, but the stuffed ones that don't interact with her or touch the toy she is using. Two seconds after this picture she promptly picked up the toy and her friend to get away from HAM. I guess she needed some privacy...

Father's Day crafting. Who gives three kids under two years of age paint??

Paint ends up everywhere, including on the children. But not on the clothes! I'm not sure why this was such an issue for me, I made sure I bought the washable paint that isn't made in baby-killing China.

The princess doesn't like getting dirty. Every bit of paint that made it was on her was to be immediately wiped off. She didn't paint much. :( I want to feel bad about raising kids who are too neat and tidy, but I just can't!! I think she enjoyed cleaning up and throwing away the paint and newspaper most!

Hope everyone is having a great weekend and is prepared for Father's Day! We're hitting up Catoctin Zoo for Father's Day with the g-rents!

FREE ENVELOPES!!!

Holy Crap!!!

I just peed myself a little!

I sent DH into Tarjay to pick up the invitations I ordered. Now I made them and had them printed as photos through shutte.rfly. They threw in envelopes! Is this common? I didn't order the more expensive invitations because, well, they were more expensive! I'm cheap! I can buy my own envelopes, and I did. I'm a little upset that I did too. I had them addressed and stamped already. I thought being on the ball with all this birthday planning would save me time and money.

Maybe I just need to get out more. Free envelopes shouldn't be this exciting!

Oh, the invitations are pretty cute too if I do say so myself!

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Sunday Funday

Another early Sunday meant spending the afternoon as a family. After work I came home and off we all went. We stop by the grandparents and then made our way to the trail.

I love walking the trolley trail. We used to walk it all the time with the dogs. I wish we would have brought the breasts with us but with our little Miss Independents we would have really been pushing our limits. The humidity was gross, but welcome to Baltimore. Poor DH, he is a trooper and always pulls the wagon. Sadly it's a few inches too short for him. Sometimes being short isn't soo bad!!

After our stroll and checking out the stream, we headed home for steak on the grill and some pool time! Perfect ending to a Sunday afternoon, no? Well again Mother Nature had a tantrum. Really, someone needs to have an intervention or something with her. She is getting out of control! Turns out the severe thunderstorms with torrential downpours and hail weren't such a warning after all...

Nice shot of the neighbors house right? That's all his damn ivy too!

At least the girls were entertained by passing poop! The rain came so fast and so hard that water was just flowing everywhere. The streets were flooded, the storm drains were covered by crap, and I'm most certain the bottom of our street was impassable. Luckily the girls were quite entertained just watching out the back door. I would have liked that they not continually open the door but it kept them occupied while dinner was cooking.

We stayed inside, enjoyed our dinner, and just as we were finishing up and heading up for bath- THE SUN CAME OUT! Thanks a lot Mother Nature! So with all the sunlight, rain, and debris from wind, I'm sure the pool will take another two days to sort itself back out. It's been fantastic! Warm enough to jump right in! I just finished vacuuming from the last round of storms. Ugh...

Off to plan some father's day shenanigans!

Homemade Gifts

How do you feel about homemade gifts?

Better yet? Is this something you would buy and give?

Maybe personalized with a name down the side? Some more/different animals? It was to be more elaborate but this is as good as it gets at 2 a.m.! This is what I made for HAM in addition to the swing I bought for her birthday. Initially I wanted to involve the girls in making something but in typical Mandy fashion, my procrastination won out and real life reared it's ugly head.

I like to make stuff, I'd love to sell my crap. The thing is I'm not confident in my crap. So I force it on my kids. But wouldn't it be great if I made fantastic crap that people actually wanted to buy? I could open an etsy store ala freckletree. But I don't have the devotion she has. I don't have the time or dedication. But would I if I did it instead of working? What if I didn't work?

Ugh, being a grown up is not as fun as it looked...

But back to birthdays, are homemade gifts acceptable? I don't mind throwing one in if I've purchased a real gift. It's the thought that counts right? Could I employ this and never have to buy gifts again??? And if twins are invited somewhere, do they each bring their own gift or do a joint one? Is there a proper protocol or is it based on home much you like the person?

Real life, soo tricky! I am planning on making the girls each a growth chart as well. I'm mentally drafting a design that works in their room. So excited. Of course I'll have to add the back dated heights from the Dr's office but I can live with that! This whole idea came about when I remember an ex boyfriend who's closet door had his heights marked off. I was a bit jealous my mother never went to such lengths. It was only a marker on a door, but to see was very sentimental. The neat hand writing at the very bottom disappeared and was replaced by kid writing. How cute would that be to see in my own house?! I'm excited and I love that it's canvas so I can just take it with me when we move!

So how about it? Any orders?? Do you make gifts?

A Week In My Phone

Since my previous posts are locked away in technological black hole, I'm calling a DO-OVER! Only I'm going to squish it all into one post because I'm lazy, and everyone love pictures!

First on deck, my lilies! The finally bloomed! I was so excited. I thought they weren't coming back, then they did. It took forever for these buds to open but I love them. I really wish I had more of a green thumb and time to devote to gardening. I really do enjoy it. I'd also enjoy dogs not peeing in my gardens but I guess you can't have it all!

Our beach trip Sunday was suppose to net me some more great beach pics to hang in the house. It was a perfect day, gray and fairly void of people! Perfect for a photo shoot! Only I left my camera at home, and apparently my kids forgot that I told them they had to love the beach! Who doesn't love the beach? I'm sure it will just take time but come on kid! Gimme a break!

So instead we hit up a shop for homemade ice cream! In addition to not loving sand and being terrified of crashing waves, Claire T. Bear also does not like the cold, creamy, goodness of homemade butter pecan ice cream. I'm really beginning to think that this cute package of kid is really my husband in disguise! But look at those baby blues!

Meet our garbage disposal, Emma. She currently loves to share her food. More specifically she loves to shove food in your face. I love these little hands and seeing them learn how to work!

Before Mother Nature truly tried to melt us we had some pool time this week. Am I slightly worried at the sun's harmful rays, sure. Do I wonder how swim material is sun resistant, absolutely! Does it matter? No because they are all so stinking cute running around the yard! Word of advice, since no one gave me any assvice while shopping, kids aren't made for 1 piece suits until AFTER they're potty trained! Especially if they love their suit like Emma! How do you left your un-potty trained kids swim? I'm a bit crunchy and loathe disposable diapers, so little swimmers aren't something I picture myself buying. I've recently been letting them just go au natural. I figure pee is sterile, the kid pool is emptied after each use, and the big pool has enough chlorine to kill whatever peeing in the pool might do. Cause seriously, everyone has peed in the pool at some point, even if the water doesn't magically change color... more childhood lies! It's the poop that scares me! That's just gross and as a mother the rest of society expects me to clean it up-WTH?!

Hope everyone is gearing up for a fun weekend. I'm back to work and hating every minute! If the weather truly does break I hope to start digging for a patio out back. If not, there is always lounging in the pool... decisions, decisions!

Oh, Technology FAIL

So I've been on a tech high. I've been blogging from my phone. I love it! Well, loved it. Apparently they've haven't posted. Thanks technology for your "publish fail" and "force close"! My laptop was getting dusty and feeling abandoned. I'm glad to remedy that! I can never replace the love I have for Esther Mac! And you thought I had a dumb computer name...

So sorry for my absence, I'm sure you all thought I was living the high life on the beach...

Turns out I was just stuck in suburbia as usual. Our normal routine of eat, sleep, play. Mother nature's panties are still in a bunch because sweet bejesus is it hot! That means DH has graced us with his presence a little more this week. I'm not sure why they just don't close school all together if they're closing early? Why drag everyone out when classrooms are going to be half full at best? Better yet, end school early like most other counties. DH still has next week to finish out before he is officially on break. I'm guessing he'll have about 7 kids left by Wednesday.

Summer break officially starts at the end of the school day June 17th and I've already started compiling my honey-do lists! Mwhahaha! I'm going to work that man to the bone! I want to see his blood, sweat, and tears poured into our house! Perhaps not all that, but I do have a lot I'd like to get accomplished. Hell, if we can get the floors done (finally!) before July I'll give him the month of July OFF! (Hear that DH???Incentive!!!)

I've also started stealing ideas from around the internet on things to do this summer. I'm hopeful for a lot of family time and activities. Nothing extravagant, but hopefully lots of memories and great photo ops! Until then I'm going to repost some "lost" posts and trudge out the last week finalizing my grand master plans. This Mommy Warden is turning into a slave driver for the summer!

Good-Bye World, The Pool Edition

I'm pretty sure I won't be here in the morning.

It will be a quick death. Hopefully painless. If the bleach hasn't melted my brain, I'm sure the West-Nile will set in over night and finish me off. Over dramatic? Me?! Never! Or maybe I'm just becoming delirious from the malaria...

Reason #7483 I'm super mom: I stripped, drained, scrubbed, and started refilling the pool in 3 hours! I ROCK!

Do you see this??

It was super gross. The tiniest little hole in the cover left the pool a lovely shade of green! Fantastic! Oh and did I mention the GIANT WASP NEST? I nearly shit myself running to the house. Of course the girls thought it was HIL-A-RI-OUS to see me running for my life. This is where husband comes in with his magic can of evicting spray. To be fair the water was clear, just algae on the sides and bottom. Either way, it's still a pain to deal with.

In just under 3 hours I had the pool stripped, drained, and scrubbed. I picked up the yard. I attached new hoses and hooked up the filter. I cleaned everything! I lubed and tightened and bleached! It should be perfect! Except...

I might have thrown out the rest of the chlorine last summer when some water got into the bucket. There is also no shock because I used the last of it last summer and didn't buy more when I closed up for the season. You know, when it's on sale because they're not going to do any business over the winter! So this week when it's in the high 90's we'll be wading in a kiddie pool because the big pool, which I've slaved over tonight, will most likely be a 90 degree swamp! But at least we'll look cute!

But it doesn't bother me in the least as it will all be DH's problem because if the sand paper hands, the swamp ass, or the bleach doesn't leave me dead, the 74,382 mosquito bites I received most certainly will!

Weekend Off!!

Today we celebrated HAM's birthday. It never ceases to amaze me how fast a year can pass. Such a wonderful day for a party too. My cousin kept it light and simple and I will try, with every fiber of my being, to do the same for our second birthday. Our second birthday that fall in 6 weeks and I've done absolutely no planning for! I mean it's all up in my head, but there's a lot floating around up there!

NEWS FLASH

I took the weekend off!

I love it! I'm ready to quit work. This is great! So much was done around the house. We went to a party, hit up the grandparents, went out to eat, took care of the lawn, and hit the store! AND IT'S ONLY SATURDAY! I feel so productive!

And since DH is probably reading this at an ungodly early hour Sunday morning...

SURPRISE!

I don't work today either! We're going to the beach after breakfast and baths! So get to cooking those sausages!!

I'm hoping a nice relaxing day at the beach will do us all some good. Sit on the beach with some books, walk around, get some pizza, browse some stores, a walk through the park. I'm tingly just thinking about it!!

Hope everyone enjoys their Sunday!

Dear Non-Drivers

We live in a society dominated by the automobile. Suck it up. Learn to drive. You friend, are a drag on the rest of us.

Seriously! Who doesn't drive? Who has a good reason for not wanting to learn to drive? You're scared? I was scared of the boogie man until I opened the closet door! Grow up or stay put, quit being a drag on the rest of society.

This has a point really, the point is don't bother other people!

So DH's nephew is going to his college reunion. Guess who is taking him for the second time? Who goes to multiple reunions? Of that's right, unmarried men who don't have a license! Of course you've figured out that he doesn't drive. It's not that he is a city person who just doesn't have a car. He is a city person and he has no problem relying on his own two feet and public transportation. Great! Good for you! Save the environment. That works in the city and if you never leave the city, there is no problem.

HOWEVER...

When people like this need to leave the city issues arrise. When people like this need to go 80 miles from home in a relatively short time there is an issue. When people like me agree to do things weeks in advance and forget, there is also an issue. I have things to do. I have a life! I don't want to drive Mr. Never-Shuts-Up an hour from home! I also think that a man his age should have a license. Once you pass 30 years of age, there's really no excuse. It's a skill. No one said you had to buy and maintain a car, no one said you had to drive. But know how to drive is an essential skill in this society!

So happy Friday night to me! 3 hours of my night gone! Did I mention I have gift preparations to attend to? Laundry to wash? A house to clean? Children to feed? No big deal right? I mean, how can I say no to a college reunion? It's not like he's graduated from multiple schools, holds multiple degrees and certificates, and should be full able at his age to drive himself! Ugh.

Enjoy your Friday night. I'll be counting and trying to remember how many words that he used that I didn't know and desperately trying to wash my brain of midevil english literature! Bleck.

The Best Part of Summa

This is my new favorite picture!

I was that mom who tried to hand over a plain graham crackers while I was sinking my teeth into a delicious smore! I got the look. The are-you-seriously-trying-to-pass-this-off look. I had been caught. I had to share. And to be fair, I did keep them out in 90 bajillion degree weather so they earned it.

Have you had a smore lately? They're better than you remember!