Stuology

Ada and I woke up this morning before Mac and James, so we got dressed and went to the farmer’s market. I came back with some bell peppers, tomatoes, peaches, salsa, and of course, bagels for Saturday morning breakfast. We came home, and Mac and James were still in bed. Mac got up when he heard us, but James didn’t wake up until after 11:00!

Ada and I went to her orientation for school on Friday. She starts Raintree on Tuesday. I really like it there, so I hope she enjoys being there.

Mac recovered the kitchen chairs which succumbed to the effects of children. They look much better. He also picked up some vinyl to make covers to make them easier to clean. You wouldn’t think that the the legs would be hard to take off and put back on, but the back legs proved to be difficult to get on so that the chair wasn’t wobbly.

I haven’t decided what I want to do today. I need to keep knocking off my chore list, but I’ve been very diligent about doing a chore a day that I feel like today would be a good day to rest. We can figure out something to do with the kids here soon that involves being outside and running off energy. I also need to make a meal list for the week. I only know what I’m making tonight.

I’ve caught the cleaning bug. It is a rare, and I don’t know exactly what triggers it, but I just get tired of it all and dig in and clean. On Sunday, I tackled my kitchen. I did the type of cleaning where you take everything off of the counter tops. I did the type of cleaning where you decide that now would be a good time to finally pack up the bottle corner^*. I did the type of cleaning where you clean inside the appliances^**. I did the type of cleaning where there is not one single fingerprint on any stainless steel surface. I did the type of cleaning where you take the trash can outside for a scrubbing of soap and bleach and then a good spray with the jet setting on the hose. I did the kind of cleaning where you order pizza for dinner and eat it on the living room floor so you don’t mess up your just cleaned kitchen. After I was done with the kitchen, I repeated the process in the kid’s bathroom. Tonight, I did our bathroom^***, even though 75% of it doesn’t work right now.

I found a skirt I can wear tomorrow, so laundry plans can be worried about later. My next gig is to tackle our bedroom and closet. I need to organize and get rid of things that we just don’t use or need, including a box of my shoes that Mac found. Well, I think that I’ll keep the Keds. But the rest need to be donated or Freecycled. Then I need to finish painting the downstairs bedroom. I shampooed all the carpets down there but that one, so after painting, I need to do that and put up the bed.

Then we need to tackle cleaning out the garage and the storage room.

I have lots to keep me busy.

*Which allowed me to move my jars of pasta and container of utensils over by the stove and the cookie jar by the bread box. That gave me lots of more room where I do mixing, chopping, food processing and blending. Lots.

**Except the refrigerator because I just recently did that. I have inside the dishwasher and coffee pot a good cleaning.

***The plumber comes tomorrow morning at 7:30am. And while I’m know that being a plumber isn’t exactly a clean profession, my bathroom isn’t going to be the one he will tell stories about later. I scrubbed every surface clean except the floor. I’ll rewipe down where he works tomorrow and then scrub the floor. I need to get grout cleaner for our shower.

I did want to spend some of the day at The Little Green Festival today, but the heat index is already 109, and it isn’t even the hottest part of the day yet. Little James doesn’t do so well in the heat. Neither does big James.

I think today is a good day to stay inside and paint in the basement. Mac has already done some work down there the last couple of days. I decided to just paint where the hideous wallpaper is at. We don’t know how long we will be in this house, so I didn’t want to paint it the colors that I really want and then go turn around and paint it again next summer so we can sell the house.

TV update: So far, I do not miss it at all. I do miss the music though. We need to get the media center and the 360 talking again so I can stream music in the living room. The tuner on the amp picks up mostly static.

The kids are getting a new playroom downstairs. I was going to dig in and steam clean all the carpets downstairs while it was still relatively empty and finish the painting that never got done in the downstairs bedroom and hallway. I was looking over the space for the playroom and I decided that it needs new paint. It still has the wallpaper of hideous on two walls and the rest just needs painting. Tonight I am going to decide on colors for it, and tomorrow I am going to pick up paint. My mom and I also spotted some storage furniture during a Target trip that I want to go back and pick up. And I want to get them a kid-sized table that I didn’t have room for until now.

I’m excited to get this done because I have this illusion that I will no longer be tripping over brightly colored plastic objects in my living room as soon as this playroom is functional.

Day 130: It’s Oh So Quiet-Shh, Shh

My new sink, faucet and garbage disposal was installed yesterday. The cutting board which is on there for the photo can be removed. You can take out just the glass piece to hang a bowl or colander. I’m already loving the one big sink. The faucet has a pull-down sprayer. And the garbage disposal is ever so quiet! That is always a big plus when it comes to appliances.

I woke up with that headache. Fantastic!

We get to add the two big branches that are in our yard after last night to the list of yard work. Both Mac and I were up when that storm hit. I peeked outside. It was quite windy! Our patio furniture was moving on the deck. All my flowers survived.

Of course, the dangling branch that I spotted high up in one of our trees in the back yard is still dangling high up in that tree in the backyard. The perfectly healthy ones that were attached and thriving yesterday are the ones now in our yard.

Buried power lines means I don’t have to get up and drive to KC to go to work because I still have power. I love the buried power lines.

Day 122: Gardening is better with a floppy hat

Ada liked wearing my new gardening hat. I don’t mind considering putting a hat on her head used to make her cry. Now she puts it on by herself without the crying. She enjoys helping with our new flower garden as much as an almost 3-year old can. Her job is to move and water the flowers. She likes the watering. She’d drown the flowers if I let her

My mother and I did some more yard work this evening. We also made plans for even more yard work. I got things put away in the garage just as it started to rain hard. I enjoyed watching the lightning before coming in and washing off the mud. There were tornadoes in the Missouri side of the KC metro area, but just a general thunderstorm here. I’m going to have to go online to watch The Office since all we recorded was weather. Same with Lost–it was mostly weather.

Also, I have added my two missing photos: Day 120 and Day 121.

I have my Mother’s Day present, or will soon. It has been ordered. I am getting a new kitchen sink, faucet and garbage disposal. I’m changing my sink from two bins to one big bin. It also comes with a small cutting board that fits along the rim with a cut out notch for a colander^*. Since the dishwasher washes most dishes, I find the two bin sink unnecessary. Now big pots will fit–including the crockpot and my dutch oven which doesn’t fit into the sink now without tilting. W00t!

There will be a photo today–promise! I even have something to photograph. I didn’t get home to make my dinner yesterday until 7:00pm. Then I had treadmill and laundry and showering and that constant pounding headache that has been plaguing me.

*If Mac ordered the one we looked at.

Day 120: The New Deck, pt 2

The deck work continues with the addition of stain, the return of the grill and the new patio furniture. They were out of the swivel chairs that we liked, so we are going to wait to add two more chairs until they get more in. Below are my flowers which are being transplanted to the end of the deck.

The only big work we have left is the trellis that we are putting on the bottom. I agree with Mac that I like our old style of railing better, but this saved us some money.

We had dinner on the deck already too–chicken and asparagus right off the grill!

We had one person come out this afternoon to sketch out a deck for an estimate, as well as an estimate to fence in our entire back yard. We are going to get our property line surveyed again because we live on a wedged shaped piece of land, and we don’t know exactly where the line is between us and one neighbor. We do know from our survey when we bought the house that one neighbor on the other side has their fence six inches on our property.

My Citrix session just turned all blue. Just in time for the game! I think Mass street is already filling up, according to photos. If we win, maybe my mother will be nice enough to stay with the kids (who will be in bed, so it is an easy job) so we can try to get as close to downtown as possible. I bet we will have to park hella far away and walk.