Last Saturday was somewhat crazy. Tanner and Jared spent the night with their friend Taylor on Friday night so they were gone until I went to pick them up Saturday afternoon. Frank left around noon to go help with cooking / catering for a wedding and he didn't get back until 10:00 that night. That left me to do all the running around for most of the day, and there was a lot of that. I checked on Wanda (one of the women I visit teach), picked up a Father's Day cake (made by the YW) for Frank, picked up Tanner & Jared at Taylor's house, took Seth to a birthday party (at Pump It Up again) and picked him up when it was over, took Tanner to the Elders' apartment so he could go with them to some appointments, did some shopping, and took some milk to a couple in the ward who needed a gallon. So yes...basically I was a chauffeur most of the day. Somehow in between everything else, I managed to go for a walk, clean the kitchen floor, wrap Father's Day presents, and work on Personal Progress. (I'm still working on my last value project...that's all I have left. I'm getting close to finishing finally!)
I was very ready for a day of rest after all that, and fortunately because it was Father's Day, there were no extra meetings--just our regular meeting block. Very restful! :) I forgot to set an alarm so I didn't get up as early as I should have but we still managed to make French toast for Frank's breakfast:
And had time for him to open his cards and gifts:
(Cake made by the YW. Pretty cool!)
His other gift is a Soda Stream thing, which he's been asking for. It's pretty cool, actually--you can make your own soda with it. Easy, and it tastes great.
I did all the cooking that day, and Frank got to take a short nap. It was a nice day.
I've been enjoying the lack of a rigid schedule this week. I'm still getting up at around the same time most days, but just knowing I don't have to get up is nice. Seth has woken up very early a few mornings--yesterday he got up at 5:45! It works out pretty well for him to get up earlier, though, because that gives him his video game time undisturbed before the other two boys get up. (They get an hour each.) We've had some gloomy rainy days and overall it hasn't been very hot but most days we've had temperatures in the 80s and it cools down at night--which is perfect, as far as I'm concerned! Last night I noticed the fireflies for the first time. I love when the fireflies come out--the trees look like they have tiny white blinking Christmas lights on them!
We did have a number of appointments this week. I made the boys get up fairly early on Monday morning because I had a doctor appointment at 8:00. Just a check up--I haven't had one of those in about 13 years so I figured it was about time. I'm pretty healthy overall but had a few things I wanted looked at--like one of my toenails, which has some sort of fungus, my eyes that are watering again, and a spot on my hand that keeps scabbing and then coming back. I have to have a dermatologist look at that. I got some allergy drops for my eyes to see if that helps them--I think it might be helping a little.
Tanner had his senior portraits taken on Monday morning also. I admit when I got the notice in the mail for those that I teared up a bit. I don't feel ready to have another son leaving home so soon! Time needs to stop! Hopefully the pictures turned out ok.
Tuesday afternoon I had a presidency meeting. Afterwards we cleaned out the RS closet so I didn't get home until nearly dinner time. Frank went to help with a new member discussion that evening and Tanner went to a movie with friends.
Wednesday I had my follow up appointment with the eye doctor. That evening I made dinner for a family in the ward. Tanner & Jared went to their friend Ian's house for the afternoon and from there to YM. I had a meeting with the bishop that evening also.
Thursday I had visiting teaching appointments all morning and that afternoon the boys and I had dentist appointments. No one has cavities, which is always good news. Jared went to the church to play basketball with friends that evening. Today we didn't have any appointments, which was nice for a change. I spent most of the day updating the budget.
Seth has kept busy with some of his birthday presents. One of his friends gave him this fun book called The Boys' Doodle Book which is full of half-finished pictures and a prompt to help you finish the picture. For example, a guy swimming with a frightened expression on his face and the prompt "What is nibbling on his toes?" He has loved drawing in that! (In the picture, he is drawing what's under the bed.):
Seth also used his birthday money from Grandma & Grandpa plus some money he's saved up to buy this Star Wars Lego set:
Tanner spent a couple of hours helping him build it yesterday. Right before I took the picture, Seth broke it, but I helped him put it back together after I took the picture. It was ridiculous how we ended up buying it--we found it on WalMart's website for the best price and it said they were in stock at our local store, so we took him over to buy it on Monday evening. They had several there but the price was nearly $15 more than the price listed online. The employees told us they sometimes have special prices for items online and unfortunately they aren't allowed to match them. They said we could go online and order it though, if we wanted the lower price and then they'd let us "pick it up". Frank did that on his iPhone but then the system messed up and said that there weren't any in stock at our store, so they had to send one to the store for us and wouldn't allow us to pick one up until the new set arrived. So we ended up having to wait until Thursday until the set they sent to the store got there to pick it up! Pretty dumb! We probably would have given up and bought one of the ones at the store but it bugged us to pay that extra $15.
We still don't have furniture, by the way. The new couches are supposed to come sometime next week. I'm praying the new ones aren't damaged too. In the meantime, the boys dragged this big pillow downstairs so they can lie on it and watch television. I thought this was cute that Seth & Snickers were sharing the pillow!:
In between all the appointments this week, we had work to do--all the normal shopping, cleaning, laundry etc. The boys had chores to do every day to help me, plus they have been working on cleaning their room thoroughly, doing a little bit every day. They aren't done yet, and it certainly isn't up to my standards, but it is definitely looking a lot better. I've also worked on the basement a little, and it is looking better although I'm not done yet either. Here's a few pictures so you can see the progress:
(Before)
I know, it still doesn't look great, but it's an improvement. All the stuff on the left is empty containers that I will either use somewhere else or throw out. Some of the other stuff will be going into the armoire when we move it down. Everything else will be moved or thrown out! See that chest of drawers on the right? There used to be so much stuff in front of it that I couldn't get to the drawers.
Another "before" shot:
And after:
We still need to remove the large file cabinet. The other stuff will be put in the armoire or moved, except I think the luggage will have to be stacked neatly next to the armoire. A work in progress, but we'll get there. Stay tuned for more "after" pictures.
I also did a lot of work in Scott's room yesterday, but I didn't take any pictures. I have most of his stuff boxed up now--he was supposed to do that before he left, but he didn't get it all done. I want to have all of his stuff in boxes and moved elsewhere because one of the boys is going to move into his room this fall. I agreed to let them do that so that Tanner can have his own room for the first time in his life--it's probably his last chance to have his own room, too, since after this he will be sharing with room mates, companions, and eventually (hopefully) a wife. Having never had my own room myself, I'm sympathetic to his wish. I decided it was ok to give up my craft room since I've accepted the fact that I'm probably not going to get any projects done while I'm the RS president. Maybe in a couple of years! I labeled the boxes of Scott's stuff and wrote down on cards what is in each box so he should be able to find things easily when he gets back. I'm guessing he's not going to want a lot of it by then!
That's about it for this week. The boys just took Seth to the park to play. Frank has had an extremely busy week so he is taking a break from computers tonight. He and I will probably go out to do something fun later.
Oh, one funny thing we've noticed Seth doing lately. When he is coloring with crayons and makes a mistake, he has to scribble it out instead of erase (of course). We noticed that when he scribbles something out, he stops and turns the crayon over and uses the other end to scribble it out, like he would do with a pencil so he can use the eraser. It's so funny because he doesn't even realize that's what he's doing. Cute! I'm going to have him work on a few school work type things this summer so he won't forget everything he's been learning. We found out who his teacher will be for next year and I've heard good things about her. Several of his friends from his kindergarten class will be in that class too, so that will be nice for him.
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