Working Spring Break

The house is taped and Trevor, Jeff and I spent the first day of Spring Break masking the windows and taping the electrical boxes. Trevor wasn't too happy. He got this bored 'yeah, figures' look when I asked him to work at the house, and he used the word 'whatever' a lot, but he worked mostly without complaint.

The big upside is that we've gotten this far despite the six inches of snow that fell last week. But it's snowing again as I type this, so I can only hope that I can make it up the driveway tomorrow. I was driving the truck, but unfortunately, the transmission died. So now we get to tow the truck to a transmission shop and fork over as much as the truck is worth just so we can keep driving it. Ugh.

Jeff primed the lid with the vapor barrier paint that we have to use for our rafter-type roof and then started to paint the walls. The paint sprayer jammed. He cleaned it and it jammed again. So, now we're a bit behind, but oh well, there isn't much we can do about it. Someone from the place we rented it from is coming to take a look at it tomorrow, so hopefully, we'll get the primer applied without too much delay. If not, I might be the one painting because Jeff is taking the Boy Scouts on a campout later this week. I'm just hoping for a week of dry weather sometime soon. It has rained or snowed nearly every day since December. I am SO ready for spring. The beautiful weather on my birthday was a big tease. It's been miserably cold and wet ever since. Having had a taste of what's to come, waiting is ever so much harder now.

Happy Birthday to Me - and Will

I really wasn't looking forward to this birthday. Maybe its because Trevor is driving now and I'm not really sure how the last decade flew by, maybe it's just a byproduct of stress, or maybe it's all those wrinkles that just appeared out of nowhere, but thirty-seven suddenly seemed very old. Evan informed me that we didn't have enough candles for my cake so I needed to buy a couple more boxes and with the miserably wet, cold weather, I wanted to curl up in bed and hide until Thursday.

But then I woke up to a glorious sunshiny day complete with breakfast in bed and decided that it was going to be a good day after all. I mean, how often does a mom get Belgian waffles with strawberries and whipped cream served to her without getting out of bed, and on a Wednesday too? Not very. Yep, Jeff's a keeper. He also gave me the most amazing printer. I love it. It's so much easier to use than my recently broken-beyond-repair printer that's been slowing dying for a year. It also has some cool features like photo printing right from the memory card and wireless printing from my laptop - no more plugs to jockey. Yay!

Then I spent the rest of the day catching up with friends, reading My Fair Godmother (a really cute book), eating my favorite foods, and ordering cabinets for my house.

And then I got the call telling me that I had a new nephew. So Will and I share a birthday now - Happy Birthday to us!

So thanks everybody. Your friendship and love made my day, and week, and month. Well, my whole life actually. It would be a lonely life indeed without such wonderful people to share it with.

Excuses, excuses...

Will I ever catch up with everything so I can stop making excuses when I let something slip? I hope so. So I won't say how busy it's been or how I've chosen sleep over blogging. I won't mention that my family has been extra needy lately or that simplifying has meant cutting out a lot of things I usually take in stride. I won't make excuses for being lame and not keeping in touch. I'll just apologize. Sorry.


But here's what I have been doing:
1. The insulation is done.
2. The siding is done.
3. I personally fixed the leaky back doors.
4. I ordered and scheduled delivery of the drywall and hired contractors to put it up because Jeff doesn't have time.
5. I filed our federal and state taxes (so I can pay the drywall contractors).
6. I selected and ordered cabinets.
7. I wrote and mailed a writing grant for myself.
8. I caught up on laundry, but of course, I'm un-caught up again.
9. I shoveled an entire truck load of gravel by myself to keep our driveway passable until we get around to fixing it properly (I am so sore).
10. I registered for the Praxis.
11. I detailed our van to try and sell it.
12. I paid bills.
13. I packed and helped Jeff, Tyler, and Evan get on the road to attend Grandma Seegmiller's funeral.
14. I helped Trevor get ready for his band trip to Canada.
15. I helped Lindsey complete her make up homework and her GPA has nearly doubled.
16. I survived being driven home by Trevor who shouldn't drive the truck again until he gets a lot more experience; it was terrifying.
17. I let Lindsey help me highlight my hair. It's now orange. I laughed, I cried, and I'm dying it brown later today.
18. I fed everybody, said prayers with them, and gave them lots of hugs and kisses.
19. I finally remembered to re-charge my camera batteries.
20. I noticed the earthy smell in the air and felt a surge of hope. Spring is almost here.