Facebook Withdrawal

So--I've put myself on a sort of restriction--no Facebook for a week.  Vacation is over and I have a list a mile long of things to do not to mention it's time to get back into a routine so that our days are actually productive.  I have a problem and that is procrastination...especially when it comes to housework and getting going in the morning before 10 am.  Facebook only feeds that procrastination and I really wasted literally hours on Facebook last week because I didn't want to do what I needed to do.  So, I am grounded and can't look at Facebook again until Friday when schoolwork is done for the week.  It wasn't terribly hard over the weekend but it's Monday morning, I'm cold, the house is quiet, and it's really tempting but I refuse to give in.  I will have to suffer not knowing Kris' agenda for the day, not knowing any of my friends' bra colors, not seeing all the pictures that people posted of the sleet this weekend, not knowing how Debbie's morning went getting the kids out to the bus and whether or not she embarrassed them by chasing the dogs around the school bus while in her pjs, not knowing where Julie and Mike are on their trip, not knowing if there are any LFM contests, not knowing if someone found a lonely horse on their farm, or what Disney princess Melinda is, and so on.  I will survive, I know I will and I'll be a better person for it.  

Weekend Update

This is what I spent a large portion of my weekend doing. I have a list a mile long of more important things that need to be done but I don't regret the hours spent on this puzzle. It was so relaxing and I needed some time for me. Julie--you guys would love this one!

Guess who FINALLY has a loose tooth???

Saturday morning I took the kids to Lowe's and they made a really cute coin bank. For some reason I didn't get a picture of the finished project. Trust me it was pretty cool! We are going to have to go to these things more often. The kids had fun and it was free!


We jump back into school tomorrow with both feet...I am as ready as I'm going to get. I know we will all benefit from some structure even though structure doesn't come easy to us. Especially me! The cold weather doesn't help. I feel downright paralyzed when I get too cold. I would not survive for long in a northern climate. Well, it's time to get the kids ready for bed...

Random, Random, Oh So Random

• Where, oh where does the time go everyday!  Before I know it it's 10 o'clock.  I need a few more hours in my day.  I had a lot more I wanted to do today and now I'm about to fall asleep...
• If you see me around and notice that my hair is not in a ponytail or straightened and subsequently is a frizzy, ugly mess...I'm trying to take a break from ponytails because I have a lot of breakage from excessive use of a ponytail holder.  And, I am limiting how often I straighten because straightening is hard on hair and I know that coloring and straightening my hair is damaging it.  
• We started back to school today with just the basics and it went pretty well.  Next week we will get into full swing.  We are going to Williamsburg in April so we will be preparing for our trip with two lapbooks.  One on Jamestown and one on Colonial America.  We will also be reading historical novels from that time period, anyone have any good recommendations?  
• I didn't finish all 101 science experiments during Christmas break so I will be making it my goal to do 5 to 10 per week until we are done.  We will be having guests at the end of the month--my sweet SIL and family and we plan to do lots of the science experiments then too so hopefully by the end of the month I can wrap up that little goal.
• We are eating mostly vegan these days.  Except that we are still eating eggs and butter and fish.  I have a dairy allergy and we've decided to severely limit our meat intake for a number of reasons so that's practically vegan, right?  Tonight we had vegan shepherd's pie and although it wasn't as good as regular shepherd's pie it wasn't bad.  Everyone liked it and ate it happily.  Thankfully my kids are not picky and will eat almost anything.  I love that it is cold because soup is a great way to eat a whole bunch of vegetables.  
• I have a whole bunch of projects I want to do and almost NO time to do them.  Here's what I want to do--scrapbook the last two theatre shows, scrapbook the Christmas card photos from the last two years (I have an album that I add to every year and it's so fun to see families grow and change.), scrapbook our Disney cruise, help the girls finish the quilts they've been working on for two years, make a quilt or two for the Linus project--they send you a kit and you make the quilt and send it back, and do the four puzzles I have recently gotten.  The only one of those I have gotten started on is the puzzles.  I cleared a table that we have in the living room and have made it a semi-permanent puzzle table.  If I have a few minutes or I'm on the phone or something then I can work on my puzzle.  Having it out is also getting the kids working on it as well.  
• Almost everyone I know on Facebook has posted the color of the bra they are wearing today in their status.  Call me a prude but I just can't bring myself to share that information.  
• My Fiestaware makes me happy.  I now have 8 place settings and it's so fun to use them every night and pick which color to eat on.  It makes my cabinet look pretty too.  I have red, purple, navy blue, peacock blue, yellow, green, pink, and orange.  I think if I had brown my set could be complete.  Now I need some serving dishes and maybe one or two of those cute little pitchers.
• I have sooo many e-mails to write and I am just not into it right now.  If I owe you a response to an e-mail I apologize.  I'll get to it though.
• The next theatre show is Grease (the school edition--severely edited--fun songs, no plot) so I let the kids watch a few scenes today so they could see who the characters were.  Hannah thought the ending was absolutely awful.  She couldn't believe that Sandy became a "bad girl" instead of Danny being good.  She was funny.

Peace out peeps!

After!!

Done!  Now we can get back to school tomorrow...

Before

This is the mess that I still have to deal with before tomorrow. I am having such a hard time getting motivated to tackle this big mess so I thought maybe if I posted the pictures here with a promise to later post "after" pictures that might motivate me to get going. You'll know in a little while if that works.

Highlights of Our Trip

These first two pictures aren't from our trip but I'm including them anyway. We got a few hours with our friends who were visiting from VA before we went on our trip. The ladies went out and the kids stayed home with Ollie. I wish we had had more time but we enjoyed the time we had!
We got to GA Tuesday at about 5 and after we unloaded the car we were off to my sister's to celebrate Christmas around her BAT (that stands for "Big A#$ Tree"). It truly was a huge tree and very beautiful. My sister's birthday is December 30 and it is tradition that the tree can no longer be up on her birthday so after our big party she immediately set to work taking down that BAT.
The next morning we were up early doing some hat shopping. We actually went to return Hannah's boots and ended up spending too much time trying on fun hats.





This is Cheryl pretending to be Michael Jackson. She looks just like him don't you think? After all of our shopping we went to Starbucks for coffee. They gave Cheryl a free cup because it was her birthday--pretty cool huh? I guess you normally have to register to get a free cup on your birthday but the guy gave it to her anyway. Probably because she's so darn cute.

After shopping Grace did her "Make Your Own Chocolate" kit. It comes with cocoa butter, cocoa powder, and powdered sugar and some other stuff and even a little thermometer. Grace had a blast and I hear that the chocolates are good but I haven't tried one myself.
Everyone came over for pasta and pizza and later we had brownie sundaes for Cheryl's birthday. Below is my nephew, Harrison, he just turned 16. He can drive a car. Crazy!


Thursday we left and headed north to Dillard, GA. We stopped at the Tallullah Gorge on the way, it was foggy so visibility wasn't so good but it was beautiful anyway. Of course we had us some boiled peanuts while looking at the gorge. You can't go to north GA without stopping for boiled peanuts. After leaving there we met our Chicago family at the hotel and celebrated Christmas again. I was most excited about having a cup of coffee with some Bailey's Irish Cream in it. Those Irish sure know how to make some cream! The kids tried out their new things and we just hang out until time to go to dinner. We ate at the famous Dillard House and it was soooo good! Country cooking at its best and lots of it. I need to find their recipe for cabbage casserole. Yum! After dinner we visited with some friends that we haven't seen in years. They live and work at a school up there. We had a great time catching up and talking.
After ringing in the new year we were up early to have some breakfast, pack, and go to the cabin in Franklin, NC. I spent most of the day resting and reading while everyone else hiked and toured. That night we had Mom's famous turkey pie all the way from Chicago for dinner and then just hung around the cabin. The kids gave themselves tattoos with a kit Grace got for Christmas.




We played a great game called "Totally Gross." You move around the board answering science questions and occasionally land on a "totally gross" spot. Then you have to take a totally gross card and do one of the two things described on the card. One of the things Joe had to do was crawl around like a dung beetle and pretend to lay eggs on a ball of poop. Below Hannah is trying to touch her nose to her toes. I can't remember the other things they had to do right now but they were all very funny. I think a very smart thirteen year old boy designed this game.

Saturday we got all bundled up and went out to do some sightseeing. We did a little shopping in Dillsboro, I got an ornament and a great set of retro looking napkins and placemats. Then we went out for pizza and then drove up the mountain a little ways and came upon some redneck sledding. There were a couple of snow/ice covered hills right on the side of the road and tons of people were parked and were sledding on whatever they could find. There were people sledding on boxes, cookie sheets, laundry baskets, and pieces of broken plastic sleds. My kids sledded on small shards of broken plastic sleds. It's so funny to see southerners frolicking in the snow. Many were probably seeing snow for the first time. I got some pictures but they are on Ollie's camera so they will have to come later. We spent a quiet evening in the cabin and started some packing.
We were up early Sunday morning and on our way home. We took the scenic route and saw lots of pretty, frozen waterfalls. We got home late last night and so begins the unpacking and cleaning up of Christmas so we can be ready to start school later this week.

Guess What?

The rustic cabin has heat, internet access, and a mouse!  Makes things comfortable and a bit exciting.  The rest of the family did some hiking and touring of the area today.  I spent most of the day on the couch with a book, a cup of coffee, and a quilt.  I needed some time alone and I'm feeling much better since I had it.  It's hard to know that Melanie's funeral will be tomorrow and I will not be there.  Not physically at least, I know my thoughts and prayers will be with her family and other friends tomorrow afternoon.  

We spent the evening playing some games and roasting marshmallows and talking about where we thought the mouse was and what the mouse might do in the middle of the night.  We think he is behind a dresser in the living room right now, that's where I saw him run to earlier today.  I think it will freak me out a bit to have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night but I'll be brave.  I'm not really scared of the mouse but also don't want to see it, touch it, or hear it.  Well, I am off to bed...sweet dreams!