Warnerharmer wants a new kitchen. Warnerharmer can't afford a new kitchen. This afternoon, when the usual suspects were over for lunch, oropher_777, Nana and I were cleaning up after lunch and lamenting my kitchen problems. After looking over my kitchen objectively, they both came up with some good suggestions, that we implemented. We turned the table in the eat-in part of the kitchen 90 degrees, moved the microwave that was on the counter onto a stand that is under the telephone, and rearranged a few other odds and ends. That freed up a lot of counter space (a precious commodity in my kitchen). We have a microwave over our stove, but it is not working, so we keep Nesterino's cups and other supplies in it. Our free-standing microwave is huge, and takes up a lot of space. By turning the table, it is not so bad to get by when passing through the kitchen. Things look much better, and I did not have to spend $80,000 :-) That will have to do me for now.

Now for updates:
Big Joker: The deer in GA are safe.
Warnerharmer: Trying to declutter the house.
Little Miss: Put bows in Nesterino's hair the other day and said, "Now he's a sister!"
Nesterino: Does not like bows in his hair.
Lucy: Meow!

I took the Little Miss to see a ballet production of "Pilgrim's Progress" this afternoon. It was held at our church and produced by a woman who has a ballet ministry that caters to home-schooled children. The LM watched it very intently, and a few parts were scary for her. After it was over, she asked why she was not in it.

This morning the Little Miss had a soccer game. She played very well, getting into the thick of things and getting the ball away from the other team, but the other team was older and beat them pretty badly (2 to 15 :-( ). She really wants to score a goal before the season is out. There are only two games left. Big Joker stayed home with Nesterino during the game. If Nesterino goes to a game, we spend the whole time trying to keep him off of the playing field. He dribbles very well, and knows to head for the goal. We'll put him in kiddie kickers when he is 3.

I'm finally getting around to posting about Halloween. It rained (of course). The LM's soccer game was canceled; however, the playgroup/neighborhood party was not. Big Joker went hunting that Friday night and came back around 3:00 on Saturday afternoon and went with us to the party. The family who hosted rented a blowup bouncy thing (I'm not sure what else to call it). The kids loved it. Nesterino was too small to be on it without an adult, so I went with him. It did not take him long before he figured out how to climb up to the top of the slide and go down it. He managed to escape from me once while we were in the back yard and got into the blowup thingy and before I could catch him, he make it down the slide by himself.

Big Joker was tired from hunting, so I got to take the kids trick-or-treating. We went with a neighbor down the street, who has a daughter one year older than the LM. It was drizzling, and I pulled Nesterino around in our red wagon. I informed the LM, before starting, that I would not be pulling her in the wagon. 70 pounds of kids are way too much for me! The LM ended up getting more candy that I wanted her to have in a year. I pared it down some and took our leftovers and gave it to someone in the neighborhood who was collecting for her church to give to the homeless.

Nesterino was a bee and the LM was Tinkerbell. Nesterino did not care for the cute hood on his costume. He would only wear it for about 30 seconds before taking it off. I did manage to get one picture of him with it completely on:







Blowup bouncy thingy:


Ill fated attempt to get a picture of the kids:


We went trick-or-treating with the girl in the middle:

What's with rain on the weekends around here? We had drizzle today, but it was not enough to cancel the LM's soccer practice. I really did not want to go with Nesterino, as I knew all he would do is play in the mud. That is what he did. At first the LM did not like the rain and wanted to stay on the sidelines. After some not so gentle encouragement from her mother, she did go out and practice. I have a babysitter for Nesterino tomorrow morning, so I can watch the LM play instead of chasing him around. If the game gets canceled, I'm going take a two hour mini vacation (that seems to be the most time I can get to myself at any given time :-( It won't exactly be a European vacation.

After we went to practice, we went to a Greek restaurant with some of the other families for dinner. It was pretty good. I had a gyro platter and got the kids pizzas made on pita bread.

This morning, we had Sam over to play. The girls had a great time. I found some cutout snowflake patterns on the Internet for them to cut. Nesterino followed them everywhere. He also flirted with Sam quite a bit (she's lovely).

Daylight Saving time ends tomorrow night, so I'm keeping the kids up a little later tonight, so they will sleep longer in the morning. Nesterino is still waking me up several times a night. I usually don't go into his room, unless he really hollers, but it does really break up my sleep.

I had a stomach virus again this week! I'm the only one in the family who got it. When we were all sick two weeks ago, Big Joker had different symptoms from the rest of us. What I had this week was very much like what he had. He stayed home on Tuesday, because I was too sick to take care of the kids. The upside to all of this is that my foot that I injured about a month ago is much better. Staying off of it for a day and not hauling Nesterino around really helped.

My mission for this week is to seek and find new hearing aids. We have to turn in our Flex plan numbers for next year, and hearing aids come under that category where you can set aside pretax money to pay for them. My hearing got much worse around the time I had Nesterino (not only do they drain away all of your brain cells, but babies leach your hearing too!) Things have changed in the hearing world greatly, since I last investigated available technology. I'm going with behind the ear ones that are Bluetooth capable. They will be able to receive input from a Bluetooth phone. They will also work in concert with each other for better directional hearing. I can also listen on a regular phone and have the sound piped into both ears. I've been having people repeat what they say too much, and I can't understand the Little Miss always when she talks to me. They aren't giving them away, that's for sure. Mine are going to cost $5200. Ouch! At least they should last twice as long as my current ones did.

We went to playgroup this afternoon at a public playground. Nesterino found himself an older woman (6 years old), and she chased him around and went down the slides with him for the whole time. Her two younger sisters would jump when he went across a bridge on one of the pieces of equipment, and he would laugh and shriek. Made my job much easier. That boy's going to be trouble with the women when he gets older!

Now for some pictures:




What happens to you when you have an older sister:

Last week was pretty rough as weeks go. We fast forward to Friday morning, and Big Joker is still sick. Our house guest was not able to come because of a family emergency. I have lunch to cook for 100 by noon. I now need to take the kids to my sitter instead of having her come over. This set me back 45 minutes. I got to church and the snack had just been set up, and I am running around trying to get ovens started, pots of water boiling, potatoes prepped and a million other things going. I did finally get the potatoes into the oven and knew it was going to be a pretty close call if they were ready in time for lunch. The other woman doing lunch with me got there at 11:15. We started clearing and putting away the snack stuff and setting out the condiments and other things for lunch. We discovered the salad greens in the fridge were wilted and slimy, as they had frozen some. We had to pick through them (another time-consuming chore). I ended up sending word to our pastor that lunch was going to be delayed 15 minutes.

Too much happened to enumerate here but I did want to smack one presbyter. A fellow reeking of cigar smoke came into the kitchen right as we were putting the food out bugging us for a small can. He's getting in our way, and stinking up the kitchen, and I asked what he needed it for, and maybe we could think of something else for him to use. He said he wanted to put it in the cup holder of his car for his cigar. Arrgh! I wanted to give him a kick in the can! Anyway, everyone was fed and no one got food poisoning (my high standards for cooking). The attendees were very appreciative of the hot meal.

Big Joker was sick enough on Friday that he did not go hunting (that means he was dang near dead). If I were laying, bleeding in the street, and he was heading for the opening of hunting season, he'd check and say, I see you still have a couple of pints of blood left. I'll see you when I get back!

The LM's soccer practice was canceled Friday because of rain. The EPA contacted the YMCA with a warning of possible fluke (parasite) infestation in the playing fields, so they canceled Saturday's games. They are going to treat the fields with lime this week. They have already had a game and a practice there. Of course Nesterino rolled all over the place on the damp ground during the game. Yuck!

Warnerharmer: Feels like she's been beat up one side and down the other with a bat. No yuking, since late last night.
Big Joker: About the same as warnerharmer.
Little Miss: No yuke, since Monday morning. Not giving her sick parents a break at all!
Nesterino: No yuke, since Monday evening. Teething horribly. Woke up a bunch last night.
Lucy: Meow!

This has not been a kind week. With everyone being sick, and trying to get ready for Friday morning has been rough. I injured my foot at the end of last week (OK, I was dumb. Playing soccer with the LM barefooted. Kicking the ball did it). My back and neck are out, as well as my left knee (my right foot is the one that is injured). Lugging my chunk of an 18 month old around is pretty hard. I'm making him climb up and down the stairs though. The chiropractor will be able to fix everything but my foot. Unfortunately, I had to cancel my appointment this morning, because I was too sick to go :-(

Friday morning, I am cooking lunch for 100 with another woman from my church. We have a guest arriving for two nights tomorrow evening. Friday afternoon, the LM has soccer practice. Saturday morning, she has a game. Saturday afternoon the kids have a birthday party to attend. Saturday night, Oropher and I are going to eat together. After this week, I suggest Thai. I'll buy! Sunday, the usual suspects here (at least I have everything ready for that. We had to cancel last week, so I just chucked everything in the freezer.)

Time to put my worn-out-whiny butt to bed. At least I have all the potatoes washed now.

I was awakened around 5am this morning by Big Joker. He'd spent the night taking care of the Little Miss, who had been throwing up since 1am. He was downstairs changing out the battery in our laptop, when the LM appeared looking very poorly. She started getting sick right after that. She was still doing it at 10:30 this morning. No soccer today for her. Big Joker slept until 11:30. I really appreciate him taking care of the kid and letting me sleep. He said he thought she was going to be OK, and then she threw up her yogurt and milk. "She threw up her what!!!," I said. He won't be making that mistake again. She is much better this evening, and we are going to keep pushing fluids in her. No church for her tomorrow. With the pregnant women and some of our chronically ill members, I don't want any of them getting this. I hope Nesterino stays well. She put her cup down, and he grabbed it and took a swig :-(

I finally have my new computer set up and am using it now. It's best that I don't have any downtime, as I use this system for work.

In my last post, Big Joker was getting the refrigerator alcove ready for our new one. He replaced the drywall with hardboard, and that gave us the right dimensions. Much thought, careful measuring and preparation went into his labor. Fast forward to Monday morning--delivery time! I put the frozen items from our old freezer into the downstairs freezer and then the refrigerated items into coolers. The path of least resistance into our house is from the front door, through the living room, into the dining room and then into the kitchen. I picked up the trains in the living room, moved the dining room table and removed the baby gate from the entry into the kitchen. I figured that this would be a piece of cake for them, as everything was ready.

They came around 10:00am, and it was raining some. They unboxed the new fridge on the street, and brought in the cardboard to cover up the path over the rugs. I showed my preparations to the delivery guy, and he and his partner brought in the doors and then finally came in the front door with the new fridge. Everything proceeded smoothly until they tried to bring it into the kitchen. It would not fit! I grabbed our measuring tape, and the door was only 29" wide! 32" is standard. I measured the other two entrances, and they were 29" also. Just something else they did non-standard on this house.

I apologized to the delivery guy, and said I'd thought they would just waltz in and out of my house. He said that today did not look like it was going to be a waltzing day! They'd had two difficult deliveries before mine. He said the only way he could see getting through the door was knocking the molding off that's on the inside of the door frame. I handed him the chisel and hammer that were still on the counter. He ended up having to knock the molding from both sides. Now we have some repair work to do.

In good news, once the refrigerator was in the kitchen, it fit beautifully into its alcove. Now that it's finally in place, I love it! It's a Samsung, freezer on the bottom with French doors on the top. The water dispenser is inside and fills glasses very quickly. I like having everything at chest level, and it's much easier to see everything on the shelves. It has a separate compartment to use for deli meats and other items with its own temperature control.

We've again had a lot of rain this week. I'm hoping the Little Miss will get to practice soccer tomorrow night. Her game is scheduled for Saturday, and they are calling for rain. She has no more makeups, as we have used the only two that were scheduled.

Big Joker again fixed his truck this evening. Oxygen sensors. He's getting good at auto work.

We are getting a new refrigerator. The freezer on my current one is on the blink. This weekend is a tax free holiday for Energy Star certified appliances under $1500. This is not prorated, so if it's $1500.01, you have to pay tax on all of it.

Yesterday, we started our search at the Sears Outlet. They had a pretty good selection, but we found a lot of refrigerators had some parts missing. Big Joker said he'd rather pay extra and have something with a warranty and all the parts. It did give us a chance to look what is available. I have decided on a bottom freezer/French door model. At first I thought I would get stainless steel, but after thinking about the kids and all of their magnet toys they have, I figured it'd be about 10 seconds before they had the metal all scratched up. I have opted for white. We also noticed that you lose a lot of real estate by having water and ice in the door. The model we are getting has an ice maker with a filtered-cooled water dispenser inside.

This is all well and good, except the one I want is 35 3/4 inches across and the walled-in space we have is 35 1/2 inches. Big Joker to the rescue. "We'll make it fit," he said. So today, he has removed the drywall and molding, giving us another 3/4 of an inch. It will still be tight, but will work. We found a great deal a Lowes, and they will deliver it for free. Since we have steps coming up into our house from all sides, I'm glad to let someone else bring it in!

This morning the Little Miss had her first official soccer game. She did very well and came close to scoring two goals (just missed grazing the outside). The fields are still a little soft and were very wet from dew this morning. She fell and came running over to show us her hands. We sent her right back in telling her to wipe her hands on her shirt (I buy "Spray and Wash" by the gallon). The teams were very evenly matched, and they played for a long time before anyone scored a goal. The opposing team ended up scoring a few more goals than our team. The Little Miss seems to be understanding the game much better. At least they were always headed for the right goal.

I've had problems with her wanting to pick up the ball all of the time. This week when I would play with her out in the yard, I would tell her that she had 5 pieces of candy. Each time she touched the ball, she lost one. She really likes candy, so that made all the difference in the world.

Nesterino had a hard time during the game. He wanted to be out there kicking the ball too. He can dribble the ball pretty well and understands the object of the game is to kick the ball into the goal. He did it twice during the breaks in the game today.

Thursday, we were at a playground and watching a boy struggling, trying to climb up on an 18" platform to get to a slide. I was chatting with his grandmother, and she said that he was a year older than Nesterino. I looked next to me, and Nesterino was not there. I looked up, and he was already walking up the steps from the platform. He had somehow gotten around the other boy. The grandmother said, "How'd he do that?" I said, "I'm not sure. We'll watch him when he comes back." Nesterino comes back around, and grabs his fingers through the metal mesh step that was up from the platform and hoisted himself up. The other kid came back and tried, but he kept putting his hands where his knees needed to go. The good news is he is strong and a good climber. The bad news is that my 18 month old can get just about anywhere he wants!

This afternoon, the Little Miss came waddling out of the bathroom with her pants around her ankles, and very excitedly said, "Mama! Guess what! My poop is green!"

In other news, the Little Miss had a huge chunk of colored icing from a cake on Friday night. Hmmmm.

The Avalon has been having starter problems. This evening, Big Joker came home and said he was going to fix it. I assumed that this was a new starter. He had actually bought the parts to rebuild it. I was not too happy as the truck is out of commission right now with the check engine light staying on. That would leave us with only one working vehicle!

Against all odds (when you figure in the truck being out of commission) he rebuilt the starer, and it's now working! Saved us about $400. Way to go Big Joker!

The only flooding picture on our propery is not very impressive. It's a small Artesian spring that popped out of the steps leading to our back porch. It ran for hours.



Tuesday, they cancelled the LM's soccer practice for Friday. We are still not sure about the Saturday game. Her fields are right next to "Nancy Creek."



A picture of our pastor's basement (the wood you see next to the wall was added yesterday to shore it up).



You can see how deep the water was by looking at the heating system.



We are very thankful that they have flood insurance.

On the way back from helping them yesterday, the brakes on Big Joker's truck locked up. As he worked his way back home, down Buford Highway, he noticed all of the brake fixing establishments. He stopped and left his truck. He needed his brakes bled and another tire. The Latino worker seemed like he felt sorry for Big Joker, after seeing how caked in mud he was from his labors. He charged us $70 to bleed the brakes and put a used tire on the truck (the used one is now the spare, and he put the original spare in place of the worn-out tire. Not too bad!

In my 28 years living in this city, I have never seen it rain like this. We actually have done pretty well. As of Sunday night our porch was still dry (it used to get wet pretty often before we put in 2 different French drains). We didn't survive the 6" we got on Monday though. It will dry out, so no biggie there. We had more damage last week from a lightning strike that took out our cable modem, Wii and printer port. We got a new modem from Comcast and have replacements for the rest on the way (the Wii is being replaced for free!) Today is trash day, and there are several TV sets waiting for pickup. I'm guessing they got hit like we did.

We have members of our church who are having all sorts of water problems. The worst is our pastor who had a basement wall break and serious flooding. Big Joker left work early today and is headed out to help them move in with a young couple who have been going to our church. Sounds like they will need extensive renovation work :-(

I'll post some pictures later.

It's funny how events, trips, etc. can be broken down these three ways.

The Good:
The weather, condo, fun time with the family.

The Bad:
Friday evening, we were planning to drive to Calabash, NC to eat at a seafood restaurant. About 4:30, Nanner said that she wanted to take a walk up the beach, and that she'd only be gone 40 minutes, and that she'd have her cell phone on in case we wanted to leave earlier and would come back. Big Joker came in off of the balcony after she had left and couldn't believe we let her go on the walk, and he was ready for dinner. We called and texted numerous times with no answer from Nanner.

About an hour later, we started watching for her up the beach. Finally, we saw her walking up to our condo, so we came back inside to get ready. 15 minutes later, no Nanner. More unanswered calls and texts. Where could she be? Finally my cell phone rings and it is her. She did not recognize our hotel and was continued about a mile down the beach from where we were. Amazing. My brother is known for pulling stunts like this, but not Nanner. We told her to go out to the nearest crossroad and we'd pick her up. When I checked her phone, the ringer and vibrate was off, so that's why she did not get our calls.


The Ugly:
We'll start this with before and after photos of Nesterino:

Eating a crayon in Cracker Barrel:


Note the change of clothes and beach towel instead of his usual car seat cover:


I will put this disgusting story ( under a cut )

We spent our last full day at the beach. warnerharmer got the Little Miss a butterfly kite, That evening we took her to play her first putt-putt golf game (leaving Big Joker and Nesterino at the condo). The LM got a hole-in-one on her first hit! (Then it was a hole-in-10 after that, but who's keeping score?)

Warnerharmer had a great time looking for shells. There were some nice ones (small) washing up onto the beach that day.

We went to the beach in the morning, and because the LM wanted to take a boat ride, we did that in the afternoon. This is one of those sight-seeing tours where they will give you a free trip if you don't see any dolphins. I was reminded of when I was in Juno, Alaska, and two fishermen told me they were going to start a tour where you were guaranteed to see a bear... A tour of the Juno dump! There's always a bear there. Pretty good idea, or so I thought.

The LM also wanted to go para-sailing, but we're not bad enough parents to allow our 4 year old to do that (maybe next year :-)

LM and Bustered looking for fish:


They didn't catch any:


Mom and Nanner:


Mom:


Gratuitous Nesterino picture:


Who are those two hayseeds?


The boat was very powerful and fast (Note the LM's hair):




The captain found a shrimp boat to follow that was dumping its nets:




Dolphins:

Mom, Nanner and Bustered arrived in the afternoon on day #2 of our trip. The LM loves flying kites, so Big Joker got her one. She was having a great time with it, but she let go, and it headed out to sea. Nanner and Big Joker's best efforts couldn't save it. The cord was hanging in the surf, and it sailed with the tide.

Gratuitous Nesterio picture:




Mom and the soon to be doomed kite:


The Little Miss before her kite heads to England:

It's been a very busy week. We had to hit the ground running on Monday and have not stopped. We've had a lot of rain this week. Over 6.5"! Looks like another line of storms headed our way in the next few hours. The LM did not have soccer practice on Friday or her game this morning.

Here are some pictures of our first day at the beach, but first a gratuitous Nesterino picture from two weeks ago:


Nesterino is not too sure about the sand and water:




LM with her boogie board:


Action shot of Nesterino throwing sand (he did this a lot):


The Little Miss and Big Joker out in the surf. It was about 80° and breezy:

We returned yesterday from a trip to Myrtle Beach. We arrived there Wednesday with the kids. My Mom, Nanner and Bustered arrived on Thursday. Big Joker found a very good deal on an oceanfront three bedroom condo. We got it for about $100 a night. The weather was in the low 80's, and it was breezy. We took a boat ride (saw dolphins), lost my sister, ate at the excellent Dockside Restaurant in Calabash, NC (recommended by one of Big Joker's co-workers) and the Little Miss played her first ever game of putt-putt golf (got a hole in one on her first try). Had an adventure on the way back to Atlanta, that I will have to post under a cut for my squeamish readers).

I'll post more with pics later. Right now I have a sore throat and am contemplating an early bedtime (after I finish the dishes and pack the LM's lunch for tomorrow.)

Bad parenting moment for the evening: Nesterino dropped a can of soup on one of his big toes (after I had warned him about not playing in the cabinet. He's been fussy this evening (before the toe smashing too). He started throwing one of his "quick fits" and stomping the floor. He had to stop because his toe hurt. Big Joker and I both laughed. Bad parents we are!