He's Gone, Again....

It's harder this time around. I am alone with the girls this time around. My entire family is out of town right now, parents in Chicago, brother in Mexico. It's just harder this time. Before I had Judy here to keep my mind busy and the first two months I went non-stop from activity to activity. It also doesn't help that it's winter right now and I haven't been going out as much before he arrived.

His visit was wonderful, but far too short and went by far too fast. We had barely a day to sit and do nothing. We had two family portrait sessions in two weeks. Three family dinners in two weeks. One dinner out alone,a dinner out with my family, and a dinner out with just his family. We also had Christmas Eve dinner at my parents house and Christmas dinner here at our house. Both dinners were delicious. The girls received way too many presents from everyone. We had Lilly's play to go to and Kale spent a day volunteering at the school. We had a morning of baking with the kids, Meme, and Judy. The women went out shopping the morning after Christmas. Kale took the girls to the movies twice they saw Bolt and The Tale of Despereaux. It was a busy busy two weeks but it was a happy two weeks.

Thankfully Delilah and Sophia are better. Delilah hated her meds and they had to be force fed to her or hidden in food. FUN! She has also not regained her appetite as of yet. Hopefully she will get it back soon.


I leave you with our second family photo shoot:

Kale, David, and Judy

In-Laws David and Judy

Delilah didn't want to hold still but sat still when we sat her on the sled.

Sophia and her silly smile.

Aidan's sillier smile.

Lilly

This isn't the best one of the four of them, but it's the funniest.

Four generations of Kale's family. His Dad David and his grandma Margaret aka Nanny.

12 Days and Counting.....

Very, very soon Kale will be back, the 16th to be exact. He gets in at 11pm that night and I am picking him up myself. Green has volunteered to come over and sit with the sleeping children. The girls don't know exactly when he is arriving, just that it's soon and before Christmas. Lilly will be very excited he will be able to attend her Christmas musical on the 17th.

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Black Friday

As is the tradition for the women in my family we went shopping on Black Friday. Green was kind enough to spend the night on my couch and "take care of" (be the adult in the house just in case) the older three girls. Rosy insisted I leave Delilah with Jason and Alan, I wasn't going to argue. I am just glad for my brother that she went straight back to sleep after I dropped her off at 4:40am. As always I have to be the first one up that morning because I am the driver and I have to pick everyone up. I picked Rosy up, dropped Delilah off, and picked Patience up. It's really not bad, I live 10mins from Rosy, Patience lives across the street from Rosy, and then it's 5mins to my mom's from there.

We went to Walmart first, arriving just before the doors opened. There was a line formed all the way around the outside of the store. We joined at the very end and it took us about 15mins to get inside. It was very cold that morning, only 20 degrees. Rosy was not ready for that, this was her first time getting up at the crack of dawn to join us. She went the years before, but after 8am usually. My mom bought her 50" Plasma TV my dad wanted, Rosy bought a trampoline, Meme picked up some gifts for the girls, Stella bought shampoo and nail polish remover (we teased her about this), Patience bought toys for her grandson Matthew, and I bought pj's and toys for the girls. My mom got right through the line and took the tv home while we shopped and stood in line. Patience and I didn't take too long in our line. We had a nice older lady in front of us and she was not letting a line jumper in our line. It was very funny to watch her tell him no he couldn't "squeeze in". Other than that we didn't see any arguments. After I got through the line I went to keep Rosy company, it took her awhile to get into line since they had to find a flatbed cart for her trampoline, that sucker was heavy. I couldn't even lift one end. It took us and hour to get through her line to pay. Then the worker loaded it in the van and we had to take it to her house or nothing else would fit.

We didn't get out of town (out of walmart) until 7:30am, then we headed to north KC. We spent another hour at Toys R Us. Then Kohl's, Target, lunch at Applebee's, and Old Navy. We were home about 3:30pm. I found Green as I left him, sleeping on my couch. The girls were dressed and had been fed, he woke up long enough to handle that much. It's a good thing Lilly is older and can take care of things. Delilah gave Jason a run for his money, she and Alan like to fight. There was an incident with Alan's poopy diaper and her grabbing it and flinging the poop everywhere. We laughed our butt's off at that one when he called to share. All and all it was a fun day, I wasn't sure I would be able to go this year and I am thankful my family stepped up to the plate to help out.

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The Days Ahead

We have a ton planned for when Kale is here. It's going to be a whirlwind visit, I think our heads will be spinning by then end of the trip.

17th: Trim the Tree, Family Picture (ENTIRE Family, all 14 of us), Lilly's Musical
18th: Delilah and I have doctors appointments at 1pm
19th: My parents are watching the girls and we are going out to dinner ALONE/Jason, Rosy, and Alan leave for Mexico and won't return until the 5th of Jan.
20th: Kale is taking the older three to see Bolt
21st: Kale's b-day dinner (his b-day was 11/22) at Famous Dave's with our extended family
22nd: Painting Sophia's room white again and switching her room and Delilah's
23rd: Kale's parents and Nanny arrive/We will go out alone again
24th: Christmas at my parents with everyone
25th: Christmas of course/plus Kale and his dad are taking the older three to Tale of Despereaux/Judy and I are making dinner/My mom and the teens are coming over for dinner
26th: Probably family pictures with Kale's family (since Judy all of the sudden after 5 years decided she wants to get it done professionally again, AFTER she has said numerous times that regular snapshots are good enough)/My parents and the teens leave for Chicago
27th: His family leaves
28th: Not sure yet
29th: He leaves at 6pm :(

The only positive thing about Jason, Rosy, and Alan being in Mexico for Christmas is that they are letting Kale's family stay at their house. That way we aren't cramped here and they don't have to spend money on a hotel. Otherwise it sucks, we will miss them like we do every year.

I may be hit and miss again during all of this. I have been very lazy, bored, and tired lately.

Hope everyone has a great weekend.

My Weekend: A Pictorial (Part 3)

On Saturday Fort Leavenworth was having their biannual post wide yard sale. That is why my in-laws came out, to help me sell my crap. While the yard sale was going on Judy and I cleaned out the garage. I went from 18 small rubbermade containers to 8 and from 4 large rubbermade containers to 3. Their were many many trash bags of stuff (mainly clothing and paper) either taken to goodwill or recycled. While we were in the garage as the day warmed up it began to smell like dead creature. I thought for sure a mouse, squirrel, or other small animal had been locked in their and died. Judy went about looking for it when I opened the freezer up and found the smell. Now, I don't normally keep much in there, usually only frozen waffles, pizza, or ice. I had thought it was empty from last winter when my mom lost power at her house for days and brought all of her stuff to my freezer. I had assumed Green had taken everything out as per her request. I assumed wrong.

At some point this summer we must have lost power or someone left the door to the freezer open for awhile, something had to have happened. There were tubes of ground sausage that had gone bad, expanded, and then exploded all over my freezer. The smell was the nasty sausage that had dripped blood and oozed out all over the freezer. Thankfully Judy took on that task as I was still cleaning and going through everything in the garage. I am not sure I could have stood the smell enough to clean it out. She bleached the freezer after it had defrosted and then turned it back on with baking soda in it. It smells much much better, you can hardly tell the bloody massacre that it once had been.

At the yard sale I sold my couch, chair, and ottoman set for $100. The woman tried to barter with me at 8am, I told her no way it was too early for that. After it had been sold, as the day went on, I wished I had put at least $150 on it. Everyone was amazed I sold it for that price, it was only 2 yrs old and looked like it had no wear at all. I also sold the table set that went with it for $25 and wished I hadn't been so cheap. Oh well, it is all gone and not in my garage anymore. That's the most important thing, I can now park there this winter. I also sold a bunch of other things, I ended up making about $200 that day.




All of the baby stuff is going to Jason and Rosy's house. Once that is out I will be able to park in there again. Last winter I could park in there, but their were containers stacked on either side toward the end of the garage. Now there are only the three at the very end of the garage and then some more near the door to the house. I am very happy about what all we accomplished this past weekend. Even though we felt like we died every evening, I don't think we stayed up much past 10pm any night this weekend.

Wordless Wednesday

These are from our trip to Branson and they are all out of order. I didn't feel like fixing them :P

Nonnie and Delilah at Table Rock Lake Dam

Green and Aidan at Table Rock Lake Dam

Sophia looking at the trout at the fish hatchery @ Table Rock Lake

Pa and the girls feeding the fish @ the hatchery

Nadja and Delilah in the conservation learning room while we waited for them to feed the fish

Lilly swimming at the hotel pool

Delilah and Nonnie, she loves the water

Green "helping" Aidan who didn't want/need his help

Checking out how high Table Rock Lake is, to put it in perspective, these are the steps to take you down to the beach, which is underwater

The girls at the Dam

The Dixie Stampede, cameras aren't allowed at the show

This is where we ate dinner on the way to Branson, it's Lambert's Cafe "Home of the Throwed Rolls" and those rolls are thrown at you and they are delicious

Looking at the show horse @ the Dixie Stampede

Marion and Delilah @ the fish hatchery

Nonnie and Sophia in the pool

Nonnie and Delilah waiting for me to arrive so we could leave for Branson.

It's so unlike me to be late, but I hate to wait to see if my aunt could watch Kuddle the dog.

I had forgotten to ask her and I was panicked because I didn't know what I would do with him if she couldn't/wouldn't watch him and she was at work so it took me forever to get ahold of her.

I finally did and she was able to pick him up after work. By the time I got to my parents house my dad was already there and even Jason and Rosy were waiting for me. I thought I was safe since they are always late but of course they have to be on time the one time I am late.

Catching flies on the way

Knocked out

My dad catching flies outside the Dixie Stampede. We were there 45mins early so he took a nap.

Aidan in the pool

Look who came back to have dinner with us?

On Saturday afternoon K called and asked if we would like to meet up with them for dinner. They were on their way back home and were going right by us anyways. Since I already had dinner prepared and on the table we meet them for dessert. We met up at Panera Bread where they at dinner and we all had dessert afterwards. It was nice to see them again, even if it was only for an hour.

Having dinner @ Panera Bread

Asher, Aidan, and Aaron

Abby avoiding eating her dinner

Aaron avoiding eating his dinner by talking to Lilly

Aidan being silly

I know I said I was done with pictures but....

I found these from when the kids had to say goodbye.

It's not easy getting 6 kids to look and smile at you for a picture.

See what I mean? :P

Group Hug!

Asher and Lilly, they have been friends longer than K and I!

Abby saying goodbye. Sophia was not happy when she left.

4th of July: Part Four

Patience, Marion, and Nadja before the show.

K and Mary (her mom) before the show.

Nonnie and Pa trying to keep Delilah and Aidan calm.

I took over with Delilah and she was fine the rest of the night.

Aidan was a different story. She cried loudly for the first half, then calmed down enough to watch, but only with her ears being covered by my dad.

Asher, Lilly, Abby, and Aidan before the fireworks started.

K and Alan

I had her hold him to see how big he is.

Sophia, Jason, and Rosy before the fireworks started.

Abby and Green

She sat with him the whole show. We were teasing him because he has always wanted to marry a pretty blonde american. We told him to wait 20 years and he could marry Abby. :P

Asher, Lilly, and Aaron watching the show upside down.

Abby and Sophia before the show.

Delilah and Alan before the show.

Jason and Rosy before the show.

Rosy being silly with Green. His shirt says "You'd look better with me."

K and Aidan before the show.

We walked from my house to the pond where they hold the fireworks display on Fort Leavenworth. We arrived just before dusk and sat on the opposite side than most of the people. So we had a great view without being crowded by other people. We brought our own chairs and Rosy supplied us with bug spray, thankfully, they were really biting. The bats kept us entertained before the show. They had a little trouble getting the music going, but overall it was a good display. Nadja and Marion thought it was the best fireworks show ever. I guess in Germany a show like ours would cost millions to put on. I mean it was good, but not that good. After the show we walked briskly home, tired, sweaty, and happy.

K and I spent the rest of the night talking and loading pictures from her camera, her mom's camera, and my camera onto my laptop. I also finally convinced her to join facebook so she could see all the videos and pics I post. Overall it was a funny but exhausting day.