a nice paced weekend

Well had a good weekend and got so much accomplished,  MLK and I finished off all her fincial aid paperwork (I hope) for fall next year.  Also VR will only be helping with books as we made six thousand too much but every little bit helps so getting that paperwork in also.  So it was nice to get that off my mind.  Lots of forms to do and this time around since I knew what I was doing it was time to start getting MLK trained in her paperwork.  It is alot of stuff to wrap your brain around. 

We cleaned alot, and finished MDK room so my house is looking awesome.  I also finished the baby quilt I was crocheting for the shower yesterday.  I am going to work on some little newborn hats today.  I should be cleared to work again this Wed.  I have a volunteer job this Thurs.  I may need to cut those if I dont get some paying jobs soon.  I cant afford gas without a paycheck.

MLK and I made the best bread ever, it was so good.  I think we got rid of the old yeast and got fresh and that helped so much.  I also made banana bread as we had some overripe banana that needed to be used.   The girls are getting around to head out for their college classes.  Well better go and get a start on my day.

doing projects together

We finished up MDK's room and it looks awesome!!!!!  It was so cool and it look so nice and CLEAN!  I know the clean thing wont last too long so enjoying that.  We bought shelving with a gift certificate Dave got for Christmas for the kitchen, the white shelves looked so grimy and gross, going to use them in the garage.  They are wire shelving and we redid the entire kitchen, a deep clean on the kitchen, it took us several hours, but everyone was involved and it went by quickly.  It looks so nice, neat, clean and organized now.  We took down the snowman in the house, and did a general clean, it was nice to have all that done.  Today after church we need to change the oil in two cars.  Well better get around for church.

an interesting tv show

I really have enjoyed the tv series I have been watching lately, it is called Island at War, it has kinda inspired me to get some books to read about it.  It is all about the German occupation in the Channel Islands right off of the mainland in England.  They were deserted by the British army as they were only miles away from occupied France.  They were considered indefensible, but the Germans came in and starting using them as a staging area for the bombing of England.  It is an interesting story and well written series on TV and it has highly peaked my interest.

Today was a series of helping the girls study for their big exam, and doing errands.  I despise doing errands at times.  Have been working on gifts for the baby shower and just poking around the house.  I am doing more as my hand is much better and just being careful not to overuse or lift heavy things with it. 

MLK has been asked as a maybe if she would like to be on the summer crew at MWSU matience so that may turn into a really good thing for her.  I am praying that happens for her.
Well gotta do some college finicinal junk for grants and such so off to crunching numbers.

chores I love, chores I hate

Thought I would blog on a random subject today.  Chores I love, well the top of the list is washing dishes,  I think it comes from my first job at Sagers, I am very fast and efficient at washing dishes and I perfer washing them then a dishwasher.  It just puts me in a zone, where the montous routine of it, is just good for my soul.  It puts me in a decent mood, unless I find that MDK didnt do any of the silverware the time before :).  I also enjoy doing laundry most of the time, except putting away, if I do all the rest of the process someone else can put it away.  I abhor ironing, I think it has something to do with my left handness, but I avoid it like the plaque.  To think my grandma use to iron her bed sheets, yes and I think she even ironed grandpas underwear from time to time.  Watching her do laundry the old fashion way with a wringer and such makes me thankful for my machines of today.  I enjoy hanging out laundry on a nice day and the smell of clean hung dry sheets, there is nothing like it in the world.  Sweeping, scrubbing,  moping, window washing, bedmaking, all of that is really nuetral in my book.  I enjoy downsizing, going through stuff, reorganizing and getting rid of stuff and I am pretty good at it.  I am a tosser by nature.  I abhor dusting though and find it a useless waste of energy so luckily Dave is a good duster with his Swifer wand.  I love about any outdoor chore, mowing ranks right up there, cant really push our enbankments with my ankle.  I dont mind whacking weeds if I can ever get it started, I have a tendency to throw the weed whacker after the fifteen time of trying to get it to start.  I dont believe in raking leaves or bagging grass, it is so much better for your lawn to let that naturally decompose on your lawn.  I dont dig up dandelions, they remind me of children and little bouquets they bring to their mothers.  I only dig up thistles, and that is because I love to go barefooted.  I dont care to cook much unless it is in a crock pot but I do like to bake, and I dont mind canning and freezing stuff from my garden.  I enjoy sewing and am okay with some mending, just not very skilled.  I like to paint, hate and refuse to wallpaper or contact paper anything. I have no skill set when it comes to simple home repairs, Dave does okay but I wont let him do anything electrical at all. 

MDK room is coming along, Dave has the lavender done and is about ready to do the silver and then we should be able to put everything back and get the new stuff on her walls it will look grand when it is done.

a nice weekend with the hubby

Well Dave and I had a good weekend, starting off with Arsenic and Old Lace, it was such a good time with MLK and her friend Shannon. Shannon stayed the night and MDK got home late late Sat night from her youth group trip.  We got our taxes done and we are getting a refund, which is such a huge relief for us.  We are working (really not me with this wrist) on MDK room makeover for her birthday, Dave and MLK scrapped and scrapped but all the wallpaper is off, the holes are spackled the tape is down and it is ready to be painted.  We worked on the decorations for the wall.  We have been reworking some pieces we have around here and some stuff we purchased at DAV and then we got some picture frames and wall art.  It will look really nice when we get finished with it.  I am looking forward to how it will look when it is done. 

My wrist seems to be improving, the swelling is gone, and the soreness isnt as bad.  I have one more week in this, the doctor said two to three weeks, so I take it out occasionaly and stretch it carefully as it just seems rather stiff.  Today we have enrichment classes, and I have alot of laundry to get done.  Well better get MDK and get her started on school.

a huge blessing

Well a big huge blessing!  I have been extremely worried due to the fact that I have been laid up and my training has been postponed.  We got our taxes done and I and Dave were so dreading this as we have been scrapping by and thinking how in the world will we ever pay for this tax season.  We knew that God would see us through and he has!!!!!  We are getting a refund, we slipped down into the tax bracket below and we are getting a refund!  Yeah!  Dave will get his Redbox bonus in March, and we will get a refund and we will be able to survive.  I told Dave I dont know how the next few months will work but God will see us through and he has.  I have about a week left in this splint.  I take it off to itch and shower.  I can now make a fist but dont mess around with it much.  I hope it heals correctly.  Our first priority is to get our emergency fund built back up.  We purchased stuff yesterday to do MDK room for her birthday.  She is tired of the dumpy birds, she says.  So she is going with light lavender and silver.  We went to DAV and found some really cool things.  I found this really cool fabric builteen board with black cris-cros strips across it where you can slip in pictures.  It had such ugly fabric, well it was 70 fashion girls in those famous seventy colors so I removed that, bought a half a yard of fabric at Hobby Lobby and redid it and it turned out so cool.  MLK took the fabric for her collage she will be having to do.  We also found these really ugly gold copper plastic ornately made plastic do dads and we are spray painting them silver and they look so sharp.  We got some wall art and other things and the room will look so sharp when we finish.  She will be impressed.  After we get her room done I plan to do the mud room   The kitchen I would like to do but it needs alot of things and will be years in the coming.  Structurally I think we may need to do something to the floor.  The garage siding will have to come first.  That is a ways off too.

I have about seventy projects I have thought about quess I am getting spring fever.  I want to clean out the green house, do a deep clean on the house, redecorate and so forth and so on.  Well better get around for church soon.

a nice day

Yesterday was a good day, MDK was home all day she was feeling some under the weather, so we had a weird patternfor the day.  We would do a chore, or homework, and then watch a short show on TV, and then back again.  We really got alot accomplished, she is like us this bug just wipes out your energy.  She is headed to Dare2Share conference tonight which I think will be good.

The girls got in a big tussle yesterday, MDK has been using MLK car (because she likes it better), but because of that she has put a decent amount of gas in it, and MLK has picked up drinks here and there for her sister.  So MLK asks sister to pick up salad for her and MLK gets angry to spend money and MDK gets mad because she has done all these things for her and so forth and so on.  It has a big cat fight.  Luckily they resolved it. 

Today we go see Arsenic and Old Lace it should be fun.  Well better let ya go.

well. . .

okay so I am growing impatient with my splint and I have two more weeks to go, the swelling is gone.  I made some cute pillowcases out of heart material for us.  Dave is sick again the poor guy just cant get over the crude.  MLK is getting the hang of her new job and everything is clicking away except for me, I am on the sidelines right now.  Trying to do extra projects but a tad limited.  Well better go and quit complaining.

a good weekend

Had a nice weekend, we seemed to both get to feeling better after the viruses we have had.  However MDK came home early from work feeling ill.  She went to classes today at MWSU she was not happy but I said unless you are pucking on your shoes you need to go, college is different than high school.  It was so nice to all be in church yesterday.  It is really pretty snow outside. Dave took the girls in and I will go in at noon and do the toting around for the girls just perfer us to their inexperience.  I am off and can do it so I will. 

Sorenson wont be starting until April as they have no ability to train in March and I cant be released till end of Feb.  Trying to fiqure out why but God is in control.  I have had alot of job disappointments but God will get us thru.  For valentines day we are going to see Arsenic and Old Lace at the college on Friday.  We made some awesome cakes this weekend and just had a good time.  Well this is about all the hunting and pecking typing I can handle.

this weekend

Dave and I had planned to see Mom and Dad this weekend, but we both still have a bit of the bug so we decided not to share the joy.  Mom called and said they too had a bug so we will be at home for the weekend.  Typing the hunt and peck method is interesting for me.  However my technique is getting honed.  One finger on ieft hand normal right hand. Washing dishes one handed very interesting.  Can do most things right handed except twist a cap, no strength or skill to do that.  So plan to bake a cake, clean out greenhouse, and who knows what else but going to proabably doing alot more of the bossing then the doing.

the right handed bandit

So I am a righty for three weeks, due to my wrist injury.  Everything takes twice as long and boy is it awkard.  My knee is huge and puffy too.  Well keeping this short due to bad typing.

a blessing for MLK

Well MLK got a call and she has a job on campus for sixteen hours a week so she is very exicitied about that!!!!  That will net her about a hundred a week which will get her going where she needs, hopefully this will work into more hours over the long haul.  She also got hundred dollars back from her grants and stuff so she is breathing a big sigh of relief, it looks like she will start on Thursday. 

I had one job yesterday, which was good, however I may have a lead on more jobs I am waiting to see if that pans out, need to bid today for jobs for the end of March.  Looking forward to working to get the bills paid off more easily.  So not looking forward to taxes however.  We have classes today, I did oil on photograph for my demo tommorow and it turned out way way cool.  So that is one of the things we will be doing for photography class. 

Getting itchy for spring and growing things!  I think the mild weather is to blame.  Well maybe the chance of snow today will calm me down a tad, however i doubt that!

i am getting spring fever

I think it was the rains that got me into a spring fever mood, I keep dreaming of green things growing.  I am anxious to get to growing things.  I am also looking forward to garage sales.  We sold the Lemans yesterday. That was an answer to prayers!  It had sat for a long time and we really didnt want it to go bad just sitting there so we sold it, that will help out alot.  We got seven hundred for it, we bought it for a thousand drove about 100K miles and sold it for seven not bad.  Dave had a little bit of sentimentality with it due to the fact it was his grandparents car.  I hope it does well for the family that bought it.  Now we are down to five vehicles.  The girls just left for college and in a few moments I will have to get around for a job, yes you heard it my one and only job this week.  Ugh, I need work!  Oh well I am getting alot of projects done around the house, cleaning out file cabinents is my new job.  It is amazing the junk you can accumulate!!!  I have a bunch of old bills I will have to burn.  Found some old pictures also so am seperating out MDK's while in the process for next years senior show.  I cant believe she is going to be a senior this next year.  Going to start preppin for baby shower for Denise, just have to set up the date.  Well better head toward the showers.

taking naps

What a wonderful thing they are, I usually get one or two in a week,  I love a slow paced day when you can have the ability to check out for an hour.  It is one of those nice things about getting older, when your kids are young there is no way you can do that unless you have another parent standing guard, but as your kids get older then you can take this wonderful guilty pleasure.  However naps are free right, so where is the guilt, I guess it comes from the things you should be doing other than taking naps.  My naps are at least a hour long and a really good one is two hours!  Dave believes in 15-30 naps if he takes longer than that, he doesnt function well.  I like those naps that you wake up gooey and foggy and your body and mind seems so  much better.  Have you ever taken a nap and felt like you woke up to the next day, I have not very often and it is a odd sensation.  I quess I can understand how older people can get confused on what day it is with that sensation. 

Dave is still ill, I dont think he will be going to church, but the rest of us will.  MDK rewrote her first big English paper.  She and the comma go around and around, but she is doing well.  Writing was her last great frontier and this class seems to fit the bill well.  She and Dad sat and edited her paper, and by the end she was really catching alot of her own mistakes.  The girl has come so far and I am so glad of it.  I cant imagine what might have been.  Well best get around for the day!

grocery shopping and the like

So yesterday Dave and I went grocery shopping and the like.  We needed alot of stuff, we have a tendency to do our big grocery shopping twice a month averaging around 100-150.  Now that is strictly food at Aldis, this doesnt take into the incidentials through the week, and the monthly cleaning and other junk you get at Walmart. However I feel we do a pretty good job.  We keep a pantry, that is such a huge saver.  We can live off our pantry stuff for about a month.  It seems about every other month we go to Green Hills and stock up on meat which is usually about seventy bucks.  All in all we do well, we may go out to eat maybe once a month, if we are stuck and need to eat we eat dollar menu all the way.  The most I usually spend at McDonalds for all of us is like twelve bucks.  Dave and I went out on a date to eat yesterday, we spent ten dollars at Panereas.  That was it and we actually took some home with us.  The last time the girls and us went out we went to Carlos we spent just a little under twenty.  How do we do it.  Water is the first key, pop is two dollars a head.  Then we order a meal that we share between two.  Also free appetizers before the meal, like salsa and chips.  We  also go to lunch then supper it is always cheaper.  So we can enjoy the fun of going out and escape the cost.  When we go to the movies we usually go to the matinee in the afternoon. Most of our entertainment is free, however we do like a play now and again, but even then the girls get a student discount.  Alot of what we enjoy is stuff we check out at the library.  We also enjoy musuems, which I am willing usually to pay full price for, but even they are usually free or not too expensive.  On vacations we have been doing Iowa campground cabins which are 300 for a week.  Cheaper than a hotel for a week, and a whole lot quieter.  We buy most of our clothes on sale, if it is not on sale we dont buy it, and there are only rare exceptions to that rule.  We use garage sales, DAV and goodwill.  The only thing we wouldnt buy secondhand is a mattress and underwear.  We are working harder and harder to produce our own food.  We do have alot of pets which can cost, but they provide so much fun in our lives we count it as entertainment.  Talking about entertainment, netflix has been a life saver, we only spend 12 dollars a month and have more than enough to choose from.  We do have internet, we both need it for work.  I dont have texting or email for our phones and that saves some money, cell phones are the only place i get really irked on how much it costs, that and our electric bill, it is just high, we have the highest company around here.  Well this is how I squeeze my pennies and always looking for new ways.

helping out

So both the girls have their first quiz in their sociology class, and they have one of those old croggy professors.  You know the type, the kind that drones on and on and enlightens everyone.  MLK really hadnt had one of those professor types and MDK first experience on campus.  So I sat down with them and worked with them.  Showed them a few of the ways that I learned to study while in college.  Homeschooling doesnt give you the oppurtunity to approach this style of teaching.  Since they both have the same class just at different times we had a big study session.  Both girls thanked me and then went to bed as they are both getting the cold I had.  Well MLK has it, MDK is getting it.  Hoping that they dont have it as bad as I did. 

I just got a phone call to work and then it canceled.  I think due to the poor economy some of the interpreters have not been as ethical as I think you should be.  If you work through an agency you shouldnt go to a school/ business and then later undercut that price so you get exclusive rights to it.  I had a school approach me and I said I would cutting my nose off to spite my face.  How could I expect to get more jobs if I steal jobs.  The person who doles out the jobs had to ask all her interpreters if they were doing this and I said no.  She said I didnt think you would, but I felt it only fair to ask all of you.  I was glad to know that people know that I am honest and upright.

i didnt get the job

Well I finally got the answer and I didnt get the job.  I am okay with that, it was disappointing but it is what the Lord had for me and I will be okay with that.  It means I will be commuting more down to Sorenson, as a part timer I can work up to 30 hours a week and I will be getting a very good hourly rate so that will help.  I was hoping to do alot of work so I could really start that new phase of life where I am stockpiling for the future.  This will get us at least headed in the right direction but I will not be able to start interpreting till I am trained and that won't start until after Feb 23 I have been able to bid for hours already in March.  I am due up to bid again for the end of March in the next week.  However the next month will be slim pickings.  We have decided to sell the old blue lemans as it just sits and we could use the money.  I just realized last night this is the first time in my whole life that I applied for a job that I didnt get.  Not bad for a middle aged woman.