Happy Birthday Sierra

(If you're wondering, that's supposed to be a koala bear.)

My Kids Love YouTube!

Every time my kids hear any sound coming out of our laptop, they come running to see what it is. See, we've trained them. A little too well.

Seth likes to show them old Disney Clips, interesting videos, funny songs, and even movies on YouTube. And I'll admit, I do the same. It's fun, and it's fun to share.

So when there's noise coming from the laptop, 9 times out of 10, we're watching something, and the kids know it. Go figure.

Easter Egg Hunt

Get Ready!!!

Get Set!!!

And GO!!!

If You Want Something Done, Give it to a Busy Woman

I think it was Steven Covey, the creator of "The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People" who introduced this notion to my husband, who has since passed it on to me. If you want something done, give it to a busy person. They're more likely to get it done and with much greater speed.

On the other end, those who are not busy tend to take forever to get things done. That's me when I'm on vacation, or at least, on my last one. I was supposed to do all of my spring cleaning last week. Did I? Nope. What did I do? Um, not much. I cleaned a bit on Monday. The rest of the week I crashed out. Oh, I did go with my husband and kids to the airport to meet one of his blogging friends who had a layover in Denver. And we did go out for dinner on Sierra's birthday. Anything else? Ummmm. Nope. I didn't even have my Easter shopping done until Saturday night. What's worse, I felt awful almost the entire week because I was getting bored and stir crazy. Go figure.

So, I've decided that this week (our second week of Spring Break), I'm going to be busier. I'll make sure to go on my walks in the mornings, clean for at least a couple hours a day (I'm still determined to do that Spring cleaning), go to the library, get the grocery shopping done, actually make healthy dinners, and so forth. And so far, things are looking much better.

I think, in general, I'm happier when I have a lot of things to do.

Toileting Troubles

Poor Blake. We keep trying to work on his toilet training, but things keep coming along to interrupt. First, he came down with bronchitis. Then I took over the bathroom when I tiled it. Oh, and did I mention the bout of tummy troubles caused by (we later discovered) him drinking all of the juice boxes in our food storage?

So, even though we've been working on his toileting skills for almost two months, we haven't gotten too far. He pees on command, so much so that if he's really got to go and you tell him "Blakie, go pee" it starts dribbling down his legs. Poor kid. I try to tell him to go before that point though. He does usually stays dry for nap time, which is a bonus, but he still won't go number 2 or on his own. Oh well. He's still much easier then his sisters were. So far. Let's hope it stays that way.

How I Spent My Week off of School

A couple weeks ago, we took one of our scheduled breaks from homeschooling, and instead of relaxing, I went into overdrive.

I had discovered, to my chagrin, that my kids had flooded the bathroom one too many times. Luckily nothing was really damaged, but the vinyl floor tiles were pulling up and no longer protecting the places where the old linoleum no longer covered the particle board flooring underneath. Yup. Particle board. Oh, it had some sort of tarpaper like coating on top of it, but that was tearing away in places. So, something had to be done. And soon.

First I had to fix the small are that had been softened by the frequent flooding (no mold, luckily). Wood putty, sanding and sealer did the job. That was all done the week before in preparation for my "big job".

Yup. I tiled the bathroom floor over my week long break. Fun, huh? Well, actually, it kinda was.

Monday, I was pretty sick, so I spent it in bed preparing for the major work I knew I was getting myself into.

Tuesday I took easy and only tore apart the flooring, trim, and heater and washed everything down.

Wednesday is when it kicked into high gear. Seth helped me remove the toilet, then I set about preparing the floor for the backer board. I had to cut it to the right size (the boards are 3'x5') and maneuver them into place (not an easy task in a small room). Then, after dry fitting, I had to get back under them and smear the adhesive all over before laying them back down and screwing them in every eight inches.

Thursday, after taking Sierra to Options, I started working on the tile. There was a lot of cutting, nipping, and dry fitting to do. The nipping took the longest. I think I spent almost an hour alone on the tile that went under the toilet. I also had a lot of tiles that only needed 1/2 to 1 inch cut from the end, and because the rarely cut all the way, I had to nip those as well. By the end of the day, I had given my poor hands a couple of blisters, even though I had been wearing gloves. I was nipping the last pieces as Seth was putting the kids to bed. Once they were out of the way, I started mixing the thin mortar adhesive. Because I already had everything laid out, it didn't take too long to set the tiles, only a little over an hour, I think.

Friday, I was babysitting for a friend of mine who was out of town. Because I had her kids (the youngest only 1) all day, I didn't do too much. I just worked on preparing the baseboards for reattachment. One had to have a notch cut to fit the stop valve to the toilet. Another had to be recut to replace one that had split. I also repainted them while I was at it. Oh, and I finally found my camera. Then, after my friend's kids were picked up and mine were in bed, I grouted the floor. Took maybe half an hour. I was so pleased with myself.

Saturday. The day of caulk. I calked everything! There was the edge along the tub, the area under the heater, the spot under the toilet, and all along the walls and vanity. (We had previously had problems with the flood water dripping through those wall cracks into the basement, and I didn't want that to happen anymore.) Then, later in the day, I put back all of the baseboards.

Sunday, because I was tired of my kids using my bathroom, we put the toilet back. Yay!!!

What a week. But I must say, I'm quite proud of myself.

A Plate of My Own

About three weeks ago while I was at the store with the kids, we saw some of those character dinner wear sets. You know, the ones with Dora, Disney Princesses, Spider Man, Cars, Toy Story, Hello Kitty, etc. Well, my kids REALLY wanted them. Hmm. I actually had to think about that one.

In the end, I decided to buy the sets-Dora for Bailey, Hello Kitty for Sierra, and Toy Story for Blake. We made the deal, however, that they would have to take care of their own dishes, or I'd take them away. Sierra readily agreed. Bailey was a little more lukewarm to the idea of taking care of her stuff, but if it got her what she wanted. . . Blake, well, I didn't really expect him to wash his own.

Surprisingly, it turned out to be one of the better purchases I've made. In the past three weeks, our dish load has decreased by more then half. My kids, because they now know exactly who's cup is who's, only use one cup a day instead of three. Same goes for bowls and plates. We used to go through all of our cups and bowls in about two days. Now, we still have an almost full cupboard after three days with barely enough dishes to fill the dish washer. Very nice! And if my kids leave their stuff on the table, I know who to make clean it up. Oh, I help out a bit here and there, but even Blake cleans out his dishes as best he can. It's gotten to the point where I've decided to claim a cup, bowl, and plate of my own, and I'm even contemplating getting individual silverware sets for everyone as well (we go through spoons like mad).

I guess there's truth to the saying that sometime more is actually less.