Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Sometimes I just don't understand why...

So my husband calls me this morning to inform me that he got out of a meeting at work and the entire company will be taking a 10% decrease in pay effective May 1st...gee thanks for the warning.

I'm trying not to flip out about it but I am . I know God will take care of us but I still worry. I worry because as a one very modest income family this decrease in pay is detrimental to us. Because what we have left over after meeting all of our obligations is not 10% of our monthly income and I really don't know what else we can cut out. We do not live extravagantly by all means. I am trying to brainstorm ways that I can make some extra money but I already do everything I can. I pray that God blesses our garden this year so I can can and freeze a ton of veggies. I'm going to try to revamp our menu to try to decrease our grocery budget which isn't big to begin with. I don't really know what else to cut though.

I know there is a reason for this and I may not understand it and may never understand. I know there are many families that do not have food to eat every day or a house to sleep in. I am blessed to have what we have. I am thankful he still has his job and the pay decrease was not larger but it honestly does not make it any easier to digest at this point.

Wednesday, April 08, 2009

Just blogging my thoughts

First of all, our laptop is back. It has been out of commission for just over 2 weeks. We actually didn't send it back until this past Friday and got it back today. HP gave awesome customer service and could not have been faster with the repair. WTG HP! I know my hubby wanted a mac book but I guess this was the next best thing :)

We are about to enter the crazy mode in our life for the next several weeks. This is Holy Week so Chris has been at church more often rehearsing lights for the Easter shindig. Tomorrow I'm going my playgroup which has not met in a month so it will be super nice to see all the ladies and kids. After that we have church for Maundy Thursday. I'm really looking forward to this. I'm learning so much more this year about Lent and Holy Week and it has really put a whole new perspective on Easter. I've always understood Easter but so many new things are unfolding. We had lunch with some church folk today and talked about Holy Week. I learned so much! Chris is off work for Good Friday too! I volunteered to cook Easter dinner for my parents and Chris' parents this year so I'll probably be in the kitchen for a long time Saturday getting things ready and getting my house clean. Our families are coming over right after church to watch the kids hunt eggs and then to eat.

Our anniversary is Tuesday. We will have been married for 8 years! I'm not sure exactly what we are doing but we are going out to eat and Angel will be watching our children. My friend is having a pampered chef party the following night which I'm hoping to make and then Thursday night is my mom's birthday and the women's group meets at church that night. I believe we are going to my mom and dad's Saturday to celebrate mom's birthday. I'll make her a cake since that is not my dad's cup of tea. We are picking up Harrison's swing set finally. I know both of our kids will be so happy to be reunited with the swing set. Oh yeah, my HC store is due to stock during all of this too. I'm mainly going to take custom orders this time.

During all of this I'm planning and preparing for Harrison and Kadie's birthday party. We are having it at our church on May 3rd. I was going to do a carnival theme however Harrison really wanted a Buzz Lightyear theme so I decide to just do a dual themed party since it was so important to Harrison that he had Buzz. I think I've decided on this for Kadie. We might be getting an inflatable. I'm not 100% sure yet. I'm finalizing the birthday invitations tonight. I need to finalize the pictures for the birthday DVD too. I'm making both of the cakes. I'm actually a cake making fool. I'll be making a few cupcakes for Kadie's actual birthday on 5/2 and then both cakes and the smash cake for the party and then cupcakes for Harrison's actually birthday on 5/6. I've been trying to figure out how to make the Buzz cake. I really hate working with fondant but I think I'm going to go that route. I'd love to make one like this or this but I may go more with this but that means I have to do gum paste and I can't remember how to do it! I'm either going to do a flower or butterfly for Kadie. Whichever I choose, it will be in the actual shape of the object. Thank goodness Publix had their cake mix buy one get one free. I stocked up! I'm also thinking about embellishing shirts for them to wear. I can't decide though. I've been trying to decide what to buy them. Harrison said he wanted a big blue robot and this is what he is referring to. Chris looked at them last night and said it really was not that cool and he really didn't think Harrison would like it. I did find him a small one so I'm not sure if we will get the big one yet. I found him a Yoda and Count Dookoo at Toys R Us today when I was getting the smaller Optimus Prime. He LOVES Star Wars. I also got him Madagascar 2 since Target had it on sale for 6.99. Normally we buy him outdoor toys for his birthday but he really doesn't need any. For his first birthday we got him a stand up sandbox table that also has a water table, his swing set for his second birthday and his trampoline for this third birthday. He got a bicycle for Christmas and I just got them an outdoor picnic table. I'm totally stumped because the only thing he says he wants is that stupid transformer. I'm going to get Kadie this stroller. They were sold out when I went to Toys R Us today but I need to check the other one. All of the FP toys are buy one get one free. I'm not sure what else I want to get for her. I have a tendency to go overboard on my kids and I really need to stop because they get so much stuff from all of our family and friends. My mom got them some super cool birthday toys today. Anyway, enough about the birthdays...

The following week for Mother's Day we are going to start a new tradition with my mom, my mother-in-law, myself, Kadie and possibly my sister(s). We are going to the Gallery cafe on Friday before Mother's Day. I LOVE that place! It will be an awesome girly tradition to start!

Then my dad's birthday and my birthday! I want an Ergo baby carrier for my birthday but Chris thinks it is a silly gift so I doubt I will get one :(

During all of this, I'm desperately trying to spring clean, I'm getting rid of all my my outgrown kids things/toys, purging our closets, dressers and attic. We are getting new carpet for the playroom and Kadie's room which I'm extremely excited about. We are shooting for this by the end of May. We have hardwood under our bedroom and hallway carpet so we will likely be pulling up that carpet and refinishing the floors. I'm so excited about all of this because our bedroom is so ugly right now. We have nothing hanging up, white walls and a worn quilt on our bed. I've been putting off decorating it because right now there is green carpet in the room and I didn't want to do anything until we could decide it we were replacing carpet or refinishing the wood. So I get to decide on paint colors and new bedding :) And I will finally be proud of Kadie's room because she has the cutest pink and brown walls with ugly blue carpet. She will be getting a nice neutral beige Berber with specks. And on top of that our house will look uniform. Kadie has blue frieze carpet. The playroom has spotted ugly Berber. And the hallway/master room has green frieze. So UGLY! Harrison has blue carpet but it is newer/nicer and it goes with his room and since his room is the only one upstairs it will be okay to have a different color up there for now. Sadly, we had lived here for almost 6 months now and I really have not done any decorating. Our living room looks fine and the kitchen is okay. But other than that, it is just blah! So after spring cleaning I have got to get my house looking nice. We moved in here at the end of October and we spent November unpacking/settling and then getting ready for Christmas. I've been in a funk up until recently and just have not cared but not I care and I want our house to reflect us and our charm :) Nothing overboard, just want it to be cute.

Chris plowed up a nice spot in the backyard for our garden. We will be planting next weekend. I'm so excited. Walking out into your background and picking food for dinner is magical. I love it!

We've still been praying about where God wants us to go. We just aren't sure if the RV missionary thing is what He wants us to do. Some of the things that have happened recently have led us to believe that maybe it isn't in the plans for now but might be years down the road. I'm mainly trying to pray for it daily and pray that I take all of the open door that God gives us. I'm keeping an open mind and still cleaning/decluttering my house like it is in the plans. I will go wherever He sends us and if that is Chattanooga, Tennessee then so be it.

Last but not least, Kadie has been sleeping in her own bed from 7-10 hours every night since Friday. I forgot what it was like to get sleep! She was nursing every 1-2 hours and was in our bed. She was getting worse every month. I truly do not mind co-sleeping at all but every time I'd move it would wake her up and she'd nurse. It has been really draining me and wearing me not physically and emotionally. She makes up for lost time when she wakes up between 4-6 am. I just take her back to bed with me and she seriously nurses non-stop for a couple of hours. I can deal with it. At least I'm getting consecutive sleep. The first night I did not sleep well because I was so worried about her but it has been getting easier :)

Saturday, April 04, 2009

My excited face and more










This past Monday we had to run to Wal-Mart to pick up a few things. We told Harrison that he could bring his own money and buy something. He LOVES buying things with his own money and we let him do so every couple of months. So he had $7.00 in his wallet and was ready to go. As Chris was strapping him into his car seat he asked him if he was excited. Harrison's reply - "Yes I'm excited. Look at my face!"

Here is a re-enactment of the excited face.


The re-enactment was done on Friday morning over breakfast. This was actually quite comical. Harrison was eating his typical breakfast (oatmeal, raisins, bananas, fruit mix, and cottage cheese). He had gotten in our bed the night before around 12-1 am. I asked him why he got in our bed and he said there were monsters in his room (Mr Waternoose from Monsters Inc specifically- so he needed to sleep with us) and he proceeded to show me the mean face he gave the monster. And according to him, he had already taken care of the monster and was no longer scared but still felt the need to join us in bed. Then he gave me his sweet boy face, which still to this day melts my heart :)