September 28, 2010

Coupon Shopping

A few weeks ago, when my sister, Auntie Em, was here to visit, we went to Hobby Lobby.  Emily had seen Sleeping Beauty's mad skills with the stretchy cord bracelets, and decided she would pick up some beads, capitalize on her niece's talent, and get her own fancy bracelet. 

We spent an hour (okay, that's an exaggeration, it was more like 57 minutes) picking just the right beads out.  During our brief time in the bead isle, we happened upon four discarded (by some other shopper) coupons for 40% off one item.  We checked dates (still good, sweet!) and limitations (none, wahoo!) and then Emily made her selections, SB positive that she could make something great with them.  Being the clever people that we are, Em and I each took one coupon, and passed off the others to the girls.  We each clutched our tiny strand of beads, our cash for the purchase, and made our way to the cashier. 

Emily went first.  She handed the cashier her strand of cute red and black beads.  Now, thanks to the coupon, her CHEAP, cute red and black beads.  And the cashier rang up the beads, told her the total, handed Em the coupon back, and said,

"Um, we don't take competitor's coupons."

But, I'm sure if we had been at Michaels, our well-laid plans would have worked out nicely.  :)

I still laugh every time I go to Hobby Lobby. (Like today.)  Especially since the next day, we returned all of the beads, since there was no way Emily was paying that much, even for a cute bracelet hand made by Sleeping Beauty. 

September 26, 2010

The Mouse's Friends

    

We caught the mouse.  In Cinderella's closet.  She called it her tiny pet.  (Her tiny dead pet.)

For good measure, we left the remaining mouse traps out.  Just in case Cinderella's pet had any friends.  (That just struck me as a little funny.  Because the real Cinderella did have little mouse friends. Right? But they were cute, and didn't freak out the house owners at night.  Anyway...) 

Cinderella Perla
And guess what we caught with the peanut butter meant for the little mouse friends...?  A big pile of ants.  

Fun, huh?  We're in the process of naming all of the little critters, and singing songs with them as we lead them to their new home.

"Hurry, hurry, hurry, we can help our Cinderelly. There's nothing to it, really..."
"Oh, the ants go marching one by one, hurrah, hurrah!"

Gross.

September 21, 2010

Sheesh

Remember my midnight snack?  Well, I went all healthy and had watermelon and grapes.  Delicious.  BUT, then after I finally went to bed around 1:00, I had to get up twice in the next hour or so to use the bathroom.  Sheesh! 

And, guess what else was super fun?!  For the first time ever in our marriage, my darling husband left the toilet seat up.  Sheesh!

All I have to say about that is it's a darn good thing that my bottom is bigger than it used to be, else I would have had an unwanted bath last night as well.

And, that's my story.

OH....WAIT!  How did I almost forget this?! One more thing...

there was a MOUSE in my bedroom last night at 3:30.

So, pretty much, I had the best night's sleep ever last night. 

SHEESH!

(You better believe I bought every mouse trap at the local farm store today.  I am NOT sharing my house, even if it is one of God's creatures, ThankYouVeryMuch.)

Midnight Snack

Went grocery shopping today. I realized it was time when the girls started asking if we were having cereal or eggs for dinner.  And when my husband ever so gently said, "We have got to start making dinners again.  This is not good for our kids to have to fend for themselves.  Not to mention it is unhealthy."

Now, before you get all bugged and say, 'Well, then why didn't HE go grocery shopping?!' I will tell you that he would have.  And he would have been happy to.  I'm just better at it.  He will likely do most of the cooking, so I figured I could do the organizing and shopping.

And 222 dollars later, we have a month-long menu and most of the food to cook it up.  And it only took me all day to do it.  I took a nap after the planning, I took a nap after the list making, and I took a nap after the shopping.  Not because I wanted to nap that many times, but because my body simply would not function if I didn't.

And now, guess what?  It's midnight.  My head still hurts (although not as bad as a few hours ago) and I can't sleep anymore.  And I'm starving.  And there is now good food in the house.  Dangerous.  So much for my resolution (I make it about every week) to not eat after 9 p.m.  I thought blogging would help eliminate my need to eat (I did skip dinner because I felt too lousy to eat, so I probably do need some food) but instead it has only convinced me that I should eat right now. Because, now, I'm not sneaking around, eating alone in my dark kitchen.  I'm eating with all of you.  Thanks, guys. :)

September 13, 2010

What's on My Mind This Week

I picked up Cinderella from school today because she had a migraine.  For the fifth time since August 11th when school started.  In sixth grade, she went to the nurse an average of 2 times a month for migraines.  I'm no math wiz, but it looks like now she's having them twice as much.  Or more. Apparently, she has at least seven headache days that she doesn't take medicine for, but they're annoying.

So, last week, I took her with me to my neurologist.  (I'm upping the dose of my medicine again, but that's not the story here.) He definitely thought it was a problem to miss school for headaches--especially a daughter of mine.  He also thinks that she will get worse as she progresses through puberty.  Great.  So, she started on one of the hundreds (that's a slight exageration) of the medications I have tried in the last couple of years.  We're praying she has a better outcome with it than I did.  She also got some "rescue" migraine medication to use when her headache comes on.  It didn't work today, but she may have waited too long to try to catch it.  We'll try again later.

So, how do I feel about this whole thing?  Sad, overwhelmed, guilty, mad, empathetic, and just plain frustrated.  It just hurts so much to watch her be miserable, when I know how much it hurts.  I just want the medication to help her so she doesn't have to miss out on things.  I want it to go away.  I don't want this to control her life like it has to control mine sometimes.

Now, I hope you realize that I know this is not the end of the world.  It is just headaches, and not something that is severely detremental to her health or anything.  She's a happy (if surly), healthy, beautiful teenager, and I'm grateful she's mine.  She is a trooper, and is weathering this fine.  She's pulling straight A's despite missing five half to full days of school.  Her one request is a better curtain in her room so less light comes through.  A request I completely understand and am happy to fulfill.  Perhaps the worst thing about seeing her suffer through a bad day is that I know from painful experience that while it is "just headaches", that headaches are hard and it is no fun.  No fun at all.

So, that's what's on my mind lately.  That, and my dear friend is moving away soon and it stinks. A lot.  But, she had the cutest baby ever last week, so I'll forgive her. ;)  It's a good thing that baby girl is so darn cute.

September 10, 2010

Things You Overhear

"Hey, have you seen my deodorant?  It's been, like, weeks since I knew where it was."

Yep, our personal hygiene is of utmost importance around this place.  You better believe it.

September 8, 2010

Evil Plans

This week, we introduced a new chore/allowance/responsibility plan.  Nobody like it. 

"But, that's not fair!" said one.

"There is no way I'm doing that," said another.

"Whatever!" said the third.

And I explained, "We're not doing this to make you do more work.  We're not doing this because you should get paid what a certain task is worth.  We're not doing this to torture you.  We're doing this so that you have more leeway, so that you can have a little money to spend on things you need.  With it will come more responsibility, more ownership of the things that you will buy.  We're doing this so that you become more invested in the decisions you make.  To teach you.  Our business is not to have spoiled, surly teenagers who get what they want and never do anything, our business is to nurture and create responsible, hard-working, loving adults."

"Whatever," said one.

"Yea, right," said another.

"Well, it's obvious your parents didn't do this plan with you.  We have to do all the work, and this is not loving" murmured another.

Mwahahahahahahaha!

It's too bad I'm not a step-mother, I would make a good evil one.


September 4, 2010

She Tried, Anyway

Well, it has been a day around this place.  Poor Sleeping Beauty woke up feeling dizzy and yucky.  She was lounging on the couch half the day, wouldn't eat anything, and now has a raging fever. 

Then Cinderella started feeling yucky.  Now she has a fever, but still has an appetite.  So maybe she's not so bad.

Sweet Snow White was singing songs to Sleeping Beauty to help her feel better.  So nice, I thought.  I went into the room to check on them and Sleeping Beauty performed this desperate sign-language-of-sorts, letting me know that Snow White better stop singing or maybe Sleeping Beauty would summon up the energy to throw a barrette (not too scary, but the only thing SB had the strength to lift) and impale SW, although she didn't have the heart to tell SW.  I scuttled SW out of the room, and saved her life, probably.  Actually, I may have saved them both.   

September 2, 2010

Real Life Rambling

It's nice to be back to real life.  Except for the part where I stop taking pain killers every day because it's not good for me and I realize that my real life is sometimes not so fun.  Three of the last five days were spent in bed.  And the other two probably should have been.  Sigh.

So, anyway, there is something funny in the water here.  There are about twelve people in our ward (congregation at church) that are expecting babies, maybe more.  A couple of them had their babies, and the babies are so sweet.  I met another new little guy yesterday, just fresh from heaven.  It's interesting to me, for the first time, to not wish that any of these babies were mine.  I think this is the first time I have felt like this.  There were many years that I ached for a baby, or more babies, but that is over now.  I guess chronic headaches will cure you of baby sickness; although, I don't recommend trying it.  I do, however, recommend holding those sweet bundles of joy whenever possible.  There is nothing so precious as the smell of a newborn.  Yum.

I can't believe it's September, can you?  I went to the grocery store yesterday, though, and could have sworn it was October 1st.  There were Halloween displays everywhere.  Come on, people, no wonder there is an obesity problem in America.  Can anyone buy Halloween candy two months in advance and not eat it before you need it?  I certainly can't.  Keep it hidden from us for a while!

The twins went to Activity Days last night, and came home telling me all about this really cool new game they played: hopscotch.  I know I played it with them and Cinderella when they were in preschool, but they have forgotten.  I had no idea you could get through elementary school and not play that game at recess.  But, apparently you can.  They were amazed when I told them I had played it.  I think in 3rd grade I played it every day, and I was super good.  It's a wonder I didn't go Olympic, in fact.

Well, I better head off to do something semi-productive.  (Not that this isn't, but it is a little easier to see the productivity when your dirty clothes pile becomes clean clothes to wear.)  And I must hurry because we have another orthodontist appointment this afternoon.  Speaking of orthodontia, Sleeping Beauty got braces, and she's a cutie pie, looking so grown-up.  I'll leave you with a picture...    
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