Just for Fun

I was thinking it might be fun to give you all a pop-quiz. Here are 20 questions about me for you to answer - don't worry, they're not all hard. Leave a comment with as many answers as you can come up with. My kids and I have something for the person with the most correct answers!

1. My three favorite flowers are?
2. What is my shoe size?
3. What day was I born?
4. I predominately use which hand?
5. I have how many siblings?
6. My birth order?
7. What is my favorite color?
8. Favorite kind of music?
9. My favorite verse in the Old Testament?
10.How many children do I think I want?
11.I have lived in how many houses?
12.My birthplace was where?
13.What were my 2 favorite subjects in school?
14.How many states and countries have I visited?
15.I play which instruments by ear?
16.My 3 favorite orchestra instruments are?
17.I learned how to use an oven at what age?
18.What color are my eyes?
19.I have broken how many bones?
20.What is my middle name?

Doing this made me think of this verse in 1 Corinthians 13, "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known."

'But then shall I know even as also I am known'! There is One who knows everything there ever has been or ever will be about me - what will it be to know Him!

"Dear Diary," January 4th, 2000

I was reading through some old journal entries, and thought you might enjoy this one. :)

January 4th, 1999 2000

"As you might have noticed, I corrected the date. That happens to be the second time! But who can blame you, when for 360 days you wrote '1999'? Eventually we do get it, since you don't see anyone still writing '1997' or something like that!

Originally I was going to complete my last entry, but I can't remember what exactly I was going to say and it wasn't quite yesterday, since its only 2:30am. (From the 1st to the 4th). My purpose this time is to copy a new poem that I wrote. I am rather proud of it.

I was writing to Becky in her journal, and I ended up going through the 100 or so letters I have in here from her. then all of a sudden I had the perfect words for my favorite Bible picture of our friendship. So, in a minute you'll hear them (I mean read 'em).

But first, let me tell you, I woke THREE of my siblings to get a general opinion. First Ginny - her answer was three "um hum's". Ike's was only two and a "that's good.". And Tina's was a little more detailed than Ike's but still the same line of thought. (After she finished telling me she was looking for the wood for the fireplace in her bedroom.) Here's my poem:

God Gave A Friendship

God gave a special friendship
To two boys in days of old.
Their friendship was more valuable
Than gems or worlds of gold.

They were closer than brothers
And the reason is clearly seen,
They had a common object-
God had given them this thing.

They loved the Lord their God.
That made all the difference, see?
One was heir to the nation's throne-
The other, king would be.

There were no bitter feelings
Even though they both knew.
For the heir had said to his friend,
'I shall be next unto you.'

These two boys, whose friendship
Was more than death is strong,
Stayed friends in all manners truest
Even after one had gone.

Many years later - centuries in fact,
God gave another friendship.
Almost as true as the boys' of old,
To girls this time he gave it.

Through trials truly sore
Their friendship never wavered,
For they had a common object-
And it was this they savored.

The Lord their God was the One
Who tied their hearts together,
Who made their special friendship
That lasted for forever.

Now, I've stated my point and if my mom finds out I was up at 3am, she'd kill me. So, good night!"

THE END

Memory Anyone??

Where would you put $60 worth of cat flea treatment?

Last month I took Olive (PC's cat) in to the vet and came home with a supply of flea treatment enough to protect BOTH of our cats for a YEAR! I got the 'dog' size package (I wanted to be able to treat both cats and they don't sell the tubes individually any more so I bought the whole box). The vet gave me instructions regarding how much to measure out based on the weight of our cats, and our cats are on the small to medium size, so that meant we had lots left over. Lots.

So as far as I remember, after I'd treated both cats, I took out one of the 12 tubes, tossed it into the top drawer of the hutch in my kitchen and put the box (with the instructions scribbled on the outside) somewhere to make its way downstairs to the Entryway. I think - it could have been headed outside to the storage shed since I keep extra things in both of those places.

Then this month came around and my calendar said it was time to treat the cats again, so I pulled the little tube out of the hutch drawer and realized I didn't know how much to give each of the cats. So, I headed downstairs to get the box of extra flea treatment tubes that had the amounts I needed on it. But it wasn't there. So I checked the shed. It wasn't there either.

Now I'm convinced I put it in a 'safe' place because I have small children, and flea treatment (although it may be contained in sealed tubes) is poisonous. (Children have sharp teeth so no amount of sealing, is in my opinion, 'childproof' when it comes to poison). But I digress. It's just like me, to put something out of the way so it's not gotten into - especially if it could be dangerous to my children.

The problem is, I either put it in a VERY safe place, or I completely misplaced it and it could be somewhere that my children can get to. I've checked the double stacked bookshelves (it's possible I stashed it in a bookshelf), I've checked under the kitchen sink where I keep my cleaning chemicals, I've checked in all the medicine cabinets (we have three), I've checked in the pile of clutter that is my desk, I've double checked the Entryway, I've checked in the animal food storage containers on the porch, I've checked in my filing cabinet and I've checked the pantry, linen closet and the bedrooms (excluding the nursery). I've even checked in the refrigerator and my sewing machine cabinet (both cabinets actually) to no avail.

You can stop laughing now, I do have to check the refrigerator or outlandish places because I have been known to absentmindedly put socks in the refrigerator, clothes in the pantry and food in the stationary drawer of my desk - to name a few examples. I've also looked right at the missing object multiple times and still haven't found it. This last tendency provides great amusement for Sir since I will often search my diaperbag for a fair amount of time to find an item and when I have come up empty-handed, Sir double checks for me and finds it in a matter of seconds. So, "Have you checked the diaperbag recently?" is not just a question in our household.

Anyway, in the very back of my mind I have a sneaking suspicion that I did indeed take the flea treatment downstairs to the Entryway, but I keep thinking that it got tossed onto the newspaper basket because I didn't have a minute to put it in the storage container of extra animal supplies. The problem here is, I've put the newspaper out for the recycling truck to pick up twice since I visited the vet. I just can't be sure that I would or wouldn't have noticed a box of flea treatment when I moved the newspapers to the recycling bag to be carried outside.

I hope I'm wrong about the little suspicion. Or that if I'm not, I would have noticed the box in the newspapers and moved it somewhere else.

For now, I guess I'll just keep looking, but I was wondering where would you put something you wouldn't be needing for two or three months?

Time to Blog

It's just time to blog. I've been putting it off for too long again. All of the posts that I want to work on involve digging through our archive of pictures for the right pictures to re size and post. So yes, this is another new post while my stack of 'started' posts does not budge.

See, I used to keep a copy of all of the pictures we took on my computer. This system worked fine since I wouldn't have to wait for Sir's computer and the external hard drive to be on to access the pictures. But the pictures for this year alone (January to August) took up MORE than half the space on my computer hard drive. That meant that my computer was very slow, was so full that I couldn't store any more pictures, and I didn't even have enough room to run standard updates.

So, I reluctantly gave up my copy of many of our pictures and now there's a few more steps involved in acquiring a picture to post. Anyway, I don't need to be droning on about accessibility to pictures.

This week has been busy - I guess all weeks are busy, really. I don't remember what happened on Monday (That's pretty bad considering today is only Thursday!), Tuesday was Grandma C's birthday so the kids and I rearranged our normal routine for the day and dropped Sir off at work so we'd get out of the house earlier. We picked up some flowers and chocolates and dropped them off at Grandpa and Grandma's house. Nobody was there, but we knew that was the case and let ourselves in to arrange a bouquet 'just so' to surprise Grandma. It worked, but it took longer than I'd hoped so we had lunch at home and left to go clean the meeting room around 2.

Getting to the meeting room later than usual meant I needed to rearrange the order of cleaning since vacuuming while my kids try to take naps is just asking for trouble. But that worked out pretty well too - In fact I was on such a roll, I thought we could postpone dinner until we got home and just have it late, but Arsenic Hour attacked and I had to give up that plan.

Once the kids got up, I cleaned until they started to fall apart (which wasn't a very long time) and then we took a break for supper. Before supper though, I got some pictures of PC and Emma playing follow-the-leader while Dolly kept herself busy with the Sunday School crayons. After supper, I just finished up the cleaning, and we left for home at 7:30.

"Hey, Emma! Check out the tunnel!"


"Get down so she won't see us! Down! Down!"


"Slow down PC! Let me just grab this stool first."


"Hm, where's Mom?" "Forget the stool.. I'm right behind you, Bro."


"'Think this'll hold us both, Em? I wonder if I can stand on it."

Man! these two are either going to be the death of me... or themselves. Just today they were trying to help each other over the stair gate. And later they were trying to figure out how to step across the gap from the table top to the windowsill without landing on the chairs between.

At least some of my hair might not turn grey before I'm 30.

"La-de-da-da...."

Wednesday was spent doing laundry, bathing kids, attacking my kitchen and bathing the kitten. Today we went took Sir to work so we'd have the car to go shopping for a birthday dinner for Grandma C. And that pretty much took up the day until lunch/nap time which brings us to now. The kids went down for naps, I put the groceries away, read blogs and wrote this.

And I should go... Emma is waking up from her nap. So much for my nap... I still have to feed the birds before we go pick Sir up from work. Oh well, at least I got something written here finally.

Backlog

House Wreckers Inc.

I have eleven (11!) draft posts all partially written or written and waiting for edited pictures or just left hanging while they wait for inspiration. And do I take one of those, to post today? No, but I did resist the urge to start yet another (to finish later probably). These things frustrate me. I don't like to rush through something that I want to remember because they just end up getting skipped over or done half-heartedly. But on the other hand if you take forever to do it 'just right' you forget even more than if you hastily scribble down key points which would remind you of at least 'some' of the other little details that you're so worried about forgetting.

Anyway, this post isn't supposed to be a long woe story on my inabilities of posting in a timely manner, but rather a quick peek at the goings on here until I can expound in more detail or get a few minutes to work on one of my other posts.

Right now, Dolly is happily coloring little pieces of paper with as many crayon colors as is possible, PC is cheerfully trying to coax Emma into his bedroom where he'll probably lock her in and leave once he succeeds, Emma is blithely dragging my kitchen broom along behind her as she heads toward Dolly and PC's bedroom, Sir is getting ready for work and I probably should be packing his lunch and getting started on breakfast for my gang.

But the day started earlier than is usual, so it feels like I still have tons of time (I don't really). You see, Grandpa & Grandma C. went far far away for their 30th wedding anniversary and we get to have Uncle A. stay with us for the last five days of their vacation. Uncle A. started off staying a few days with Salad and Grace, then traded off and spend a day or two with Doc and Bashful, and now he'll be staying with us until Grandpa and Grandma come home. The kids are absolutely elated although both Dolly and PC were a bit disappointed to find that Uncle A. had already caught his bus to work before they got up. As 'the early bird gets the worm', Emma was smugly rewarded with getting Uncle A. all to herself for a few minutes before he had to leave and got to wave goodbye from the window without any sibling rivalry. Somehow I doubt that will happen again tomorrow, but we'll see.

Anyway, my kids are starting to fall apart already and it's not even 8:15, so I think it'd be a good idea to feed them before I lose my sanity. Maybe it's just me since my sanity is fleeting when I'm tired or haven't eaten in a while. Maybe it's a combination of my kids being hungry and me being tired - which is probably the most likely. So, I'll go get on with the day and maybe I'll get the house put back together after yesterday. I did laundry yesterday which means the kids are unsupervised for short periods while I'm downstairs. During my absences they manage to create enough work to last me through the next two days.

Still Charming at Two

Correct thy son, and he shall give thee rest; yea, he shall give delight unto thy soul.
Proverbs 29:17

After delaying on getting PC's picture taken, then delaying on finding a verse to go with it, I decided it might be good if I didn't delay any further on getting it posted.

This is PC's 2year old picture. He needed a haircut, but the last picture I had professionally done was taken within days of a haircut, so I figured a little variety in photographs might be nice.

Anyway, I need to get some work done in the kitchen while my kids are all in bed and unable to make messes in other areas while I'm busy.