Calendar

What do we think of the calendar? Yes? No?

I tried putting it in the side bar but you couldn't read anything. But if it looks too ugly here I can take it down. Or if it's completely unnecessary.

More "Living" Nightmares Continued!

So, I wake up this morning to my husband saying something like this: "I just set a mousetrap 15 minutes ago and now its completely gone!" I looked at him blankly with confused anger setting in. I am thinking to myself, 'how can my husband lose a mousetrap?!' And Maggie (our dog) has been in my room the whole time. Just then he says: "How does a mousetrap get up and walk away!" I start to feel this little blaming emotion set in that makes me think, ' why can't my husband kill a mouse the right way!' But who thinks things like this! This is not reality! But the fact remains, we have a mouse walking aroung our house with a trap stuck to it! So ten minutes later, we remove ALL the books from the bookshelf where he set the trap. We move it to look underneath: nothing. We then look under all the couches: nothing! We then look in other rooms: nothing. We look in cupboards in the kitchen: nothing. Then we look at each other and at the treadmill! Well, the following pictures show the rest of the story.

Yes, it was still alive when we found it. Those darn things are so cute. (Something must be wrong with me!) The trap only caught him by one leg, but he was trying to hide in the treadmill, as you can see, and got caught (thank goodness). Brent took him outside and 'finished the deed'. We had been seeing him run around in the evenings the last couple of nights but he wasn't getting caught in the trap we set under the sink, so thats why Brent put out a new one this morning. I don't know what to do about these things! Its so gross!

Nightmares

Last night I woke up around 2:30 am from a nightmare. I was a little freaked out so I decided to get up and use the bathroom and try a different dream when I went back to bed. I heard this strange thumping sound in the bathroom and tried to figure out if it was windy outside and if the tree was hitting our window. It didn't seem windy, though. As I was walking back to bed I thought that sound didn't make any sense and it really seemed to be coming from inside the house not outside. My heart started pounding as I headed back to the bathroom and turned on the little light over our bathtub. There was a mouse precariously perched on one of the jets trying to jump out. I would have screamed but too many people were sleeping so instead I went to wake up Ryan. I figured he was the tough guy always killing spiders and stuff so taking care of a mouse shouldn't be too difficult.

The man was literally creaping into the bathroom. He did get closer to the tub than I did but he also shouted when he thought the mouse was about to jump out. Obviously it was pretty stuck because it wasn't accomplishing anything with all it's jumping and climbing. So I ran into the kitchen and got a big bowl with a lid. Ryan scooped it up (that took a minute with the little thing running around frantically) and we threw it out the front door.

So now I wasn't just freaked out from the nightmare but was awake for an hour imagining little mice running all over my house. I can't figure out for the life of me where it came in or how the heck it got in the bathtub. But we decided last night Eden's getting a cat for her birthday on Saturday.

Doctor's visit

I saw my doctor the other day and I don't think either of us brought our A-game.

Him: So 24 weeks along!
Me: Yup!
Him: And it's another girl, huh?
Me: Well, this will be my first, actually.
Him: Your first? Really? How far along are you?
Me: 24 weeks. (Didn't we just cover this?) 25 on Thursday.
Him: Ok. And how is your swelling going?
Me thinking: What? Swelling? He's looking at my feet. I look at my feet. Oh, they are kind of swollen.
Me: Oh.
Him: Looks normal. Now have you been feeling your uterus tightening?
Me: ... What would that feel like exactly?
Him: (only struggling for words)
Me: Oh, you mean contractions? Yeah, I have those every once in awhile.
Him: Okay, that's normal, too.

Then he launched into a lengthy description about how if I don't feel the baby kick enough, I should lay on my side and if I don't feel the baby kick 6 times in one hour, I should go to the hospital. I mentioned this to Jacque and her opinion is that he's trying to make me a paranoid crazy lady.

What do you think?

swine flu getting out of control

Since we love to share videos

Adam and I found this interesting:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Ron Paul Interview

Lets talk Holidays!

What are you saying? We look weird? Of course we do! I got out the Halloween decorations and Brent made us all take this picture. Kasey yelled at Austin for not getting in (and we had plently more wigs!) But lets get to the point - are we still getting together Halloween afternoon? Because I am ready to partay! (kidding) But I also want to know how we are exchanging gifts for Christmas. Do we want to draw names sometime soon? And we teased Lauren about sharing her Rspberry-Peach Jam... I think a 'Canning-Christmas' is a great idea! (Because I just canned a bunch of tomatoes!) But I also have a whole tree of apples outside staring at me to be canned and Brent debated making applesauce or dehydrating the apples. Or do you want to do your own thing? I know Lauren was already working on something. But if someone would like some of our 'preserves' I would be happy to share. Any ideas?

FLOOD UPDATE

The good news is, after hours and hours of back breaking work, everything is working great, and there isn't really any bad news. The washing machine began working of its own accord once we flushed out the resin (tons). A few faucets got plugged a second time but by then cleaning was second nature. The shower heads all had to be taken apart for cleaning; but that's done. The people who sold me the Super Duper Water Softener charged me $309 last December to repair the broken valve unit on the softener (that's what went bad this time). That was two weeks after they charged me $255 for an annual inspection of the softener (deeming it "fit") and changing the water filtration cartridges. These same people told me I should have the resin changed after only 5 years of service at a cost of $700+ (that was in 2006). I refused. So, I knew they would be charging me BIG bucks to fix it; and of course it would NOW need NEW resin! So, I went 'online' and decided that the cheapest Sears softener ($379.99) was the way to go (best reviews). I picked one up Sunday about 4pm. Monday I had to do a rather extensive modification of the softener plumbing and build up a level slab underneath the new softener. That done, I finished the job today, regenerated the new softener, and flushed resin out of the water heater. Only one last problem remained. The guest bath tub has a very fancy valve that prevents scalding if the hot/cold water gets interrupted. It was plugged. Took me a couple of hours to disassemble, figure out how it was supposed to work and where the problem was, fix it, and finally put it all back together (without leaks). I lost four of my precious days, but the satisfaction of figuring out multiple problems feels pretty cool. One side effect. The old softener was a "screamer". We had to regenerate in the afternoon it was so loud. The new one doesn't make any noise at all. Big Smile on My Face - even if my back IS killing me.

ANOTHER FLOOD OMG

Yes folks, it really happened again, in the same place, from the same source. The cause was different and also the outcome. Kathy and I were busy this AM and just before lunch we took a nice walk. When we got back I sat down in front of the TV to cool off, while Kathy went to shower. We had places to go, people to see, and things to do for the afternoon. Suddenly I heard Kathy yelling that the water in the shower had stopped flowing despite her efforts to keep it going. At the same time the washing machine seemed to be refilling for a rinse just fine. She said something about granules on the floor of the shower. I had a suspect in mind but since she needed to rinse I directed her to the guest bath. I went to check our shower. Sure enough it was plugged with something. I grabbed a wrench from the garage, then decided to redirect the water past the water softener. As I headed through the laundry room towards the water softener I was wading in water. The washing machine which had been filling just fine was still filling, and filling, and filling - right over the top and onto the floor. So I turned it off and opened the back door to let the water out. Meanwhile Kathy's second bath has terminated abruptly. So, I mopped up the water in the laundry room and finally got to the water softener to bypass it. Now what to do. I called a plumber I know. His machine says he'll call back and reminds me that after hours and weekends are double the cost (very nice). Five minutes passes and he call from Timbuktu, says he can't come. I answer his questions with what I know. He says, "your water softener is broken, the resin in the tank has invaded your pipes and is clogging up all the valves and washing machine fill sensor". He adds, "you'll have to purge all the lines, clean the sink aerators and disassemble all the valves that are plugged and won't purge. But I can't help you." So I began purging lines and cleaning out aerators in sinks; which is a whole other story. A couple of hours later I got the bright idea of turning off the water to the house to allow the resin to retreat from the valves. Then turn the water back on to see if some resin would purge. After repeating this many times, with Kathys help, I was able to purge our bathroom shower. I wasn't so lucky with the guest bath. Then there's the washing machine to deal with - tomorrow. Not so sure I can fix that one. Anyway, the resin appears to be out of the pipes and we're able to function, even if there isn't any soft water. Kathy will go to the laundromat tomorrow. Only one towel was used to dry up the laundry room. So why do these things always happen at night or on weekends?

New Shoes

Ever since we got Maggie, I have had to buy the kids new shoes every other week! Well, we finally learned to hide all our shoes, so after buying school shoes, I thought we'de be good for the year! I thought wrong! One month later, Kai's cheap Walmart shoes sharted to separate. But with the additional use of a new bike and scooter, you can already tell the toes on the shoes have been used to stop the recreational toys.... So, no wonder!

So, today we bought Kai new shoes, and the smiley faces returned. (As you can tell by the poses.) I still remember mom crying while she was cleaning dog poop out of Adam's shoes one afternoon after she had just bought them that morning. (And because he went through shoes just as fast as any other boy.) Now I am the crying mom!

Of course, whatever Kai gets, Keala gets! So she got new shoes too. (And some church shoes because those are Maggie's favorite to chew!) Keala's feet have been growing so fast this year. (And Lauren probably knows this better than anybody because of Eden!) But Keala is a size 10 and Kai is just an 11. Almost the same size. I think Keala's grown 3 or 4 sizes in the last year!

Of course, she saw Kai pose with his frowny face, so she had to pose too! Posers!