If You Give a Mom a Tuesday

If you give a Mom a Tuesday, she will think it is a good day to clean
So she will start in her room, where there is a pile of kids' schoolwork
This will remind her that she bought a tote to put kids' schoolwork in,
So she sorts through 3 years of kids schoolwork.

Picking up the schoolwork from the dresser will reveal a big pile of dust,
So she will really dust this time.
Dusting reminds her that she should also mop the floors, because it has been about as long since she mopped, too.

Before she can mop in the bathroom, she will clean out the bathtub
And while in the bathtub cleaning out dust and hair, she will randomly think about a stock they own
She remembers her Dad has the same stock, so she will call him to see if he knew about the stock split.
Good thing she can multitask and still clean toilets while talking on the phone.

After she is off the phone and finally mops in the bathroom, she decides she should mop the entryway, too
Before mopping the entryway, she will vacuum the rugs.
While vacuuming, she will notice a musty smell coming from the vacuum that she last used to vacuum wet pull-up insides from the washing machine
She will take the vacuum apart and try to clean the moldy pull-up insides from the hose with a screwdriver, a paper towel, a Clorox wipe and a kabob stick

Thinking about the vacuum reminds her that she got the vacuum for Mother's Day one year
She starts to think about Mother's Day and how lame it would be to ask for a steam mop
But she really wants one so she won't have to mop with a bucket of water anymore.

Thinking of mopping will remind her that she needs to clean the toilets because she put cleaner in there then mopped in the bathrooms so the floors were too wet
While working through housework ADHD she will think that this may make a funny blog post

And not wanting to forget a blog post idea, she will go downstairs to the computer
While typing out her blog post she will remember that she really wanted to get the house cleaned on Tuesday because the rest of the week is busy

And if you give a Mom a Tuesday she will think it is a great day to clean . . .

Happy Heart Day

Even though hubby isn't too keen on yesterday's "holiday", I tried to make it special for everyone. The girls gave hubby a heart-shaped box full of locally made chocolate truffles. We gave the girls each a new Lil' Kinz and some clothes for their Webkinz. The girls wrote me beautiful sentiments on paper, which is all I need. ;) I make heart-shaped French toast and served pink milk for brunch. I even tried to shape pieces of bacon into hearts . . . well, at least it still tastes the same. The girls got to go see "The Princess and the Frog" and we topped the evening off with one of these, only heart-shaped--a Valentine's Day tradition that dates back at least 15 years. There isn't pizza like this around for miles and I'm so glad we live close again!

For those poor souls who haven't ever been able to enjoy a hot piece of Great Plains Pizza (with enough cheese to cause a coronary), you are missing out. The little honey bear is a tradition--once you get down to the thick crust at the edge, you drown it in honey. Voila, dessert!

Hope you got to spend the day with someone you love. And remember, you can say "I love you" 356 days a year.

4 1/2

See that? That is the face of a girl who is four and a HALF today. We don't tend to make a big deal out of half-birthdays, but when you have a summer birthday the one way to get a celebration in school is to do it on your half birthday. Yesterday I brought in treats for her class, she got a birthday hat and they sang to her, and she got a little goodie bag from the teachers. Even Emma made her a construction paper cake at school and a friend of Emma's (named Emma, imagine that) made Leah a picture with four and a half hearts on it. They wrapped them up so Leah would have a present to open.

This morning she comes into my room and declares proudly, "I'm taller now!" (Looking at herself in the mirror) "See?! I'm taller now! And I'm never going to cry ever again! I'm a big girl!" We'll see how long that lasts. I give it to 4 1/2 and a few days. ;) On the agenda for her half-birthday: Watch "Horton Hears a Who" and about 3 other movies she wants to watch, play with the play dough she got in her goodie bag, and play Webkinz because one of her pets is Pet of the Month.

Today is a crazy baking day for me. After doing mini cupcakes for Leah's half-birthday treats earlier this week, today I get to make 2 dozen cupcakes (an order from a friend), 3 dozen rice crispy treat hearts on a stick, and a dozen or so ginger heart-shaped cookies for teacher gifts. What the heck am I doing on the computer?!

Oh, and happy 34 11/12th + one week birthday to me. ;)

Groundhog Day

This winter seriously feels like a bad Bill Murray movie on repeat. We have now had 7 snow days (I think, I seriously don't keep track) and multiple early release/late starts. Just this week it was Monday--dismiss at 11am (apparently the back end of Emma's bus slid into a "ditch" somewhere in town and they had to move everyone to the back of the bus to put weight back there), Tuesday--no school, although it never did get as bad as predicted and they probably could've gone for at least a few hours, Wednesday--2 hr late start. And it is just Wednesday.

It is a problem with all the local schools, and they are trying to decide how to make-up those days. We will now be going until Tuesday, June 8th. We were sent a survey to see if parents would want to do a few weeks of an extra 30 min or 1 hr tacked onto the school day. It takes about 5.5 student hours to make one day, so we could maybe make up one or two days that way. I'm not really all for the extra hour because as it is Emma gets on the bus at 7:20am and gets home at 3:50pm. An extra hour would put her home at 5pm--that is a long day for a 6 year old. They've already said they won't take Spring Break days (we get the whole week off) since families and teachers have already made plans.

The kicker is we potentially have the snowiest month ahead of us--we've gotten 26 inches of snow in late Feb to March before so who says there aren't more snow days to come. In a typical winter we have about 20 inches of snow to this point. Right now were over 50 inches. Guess what is predicted for Saturday? Yup, another 4-6" of snow. Repeat ad nauseum.

What's in a name

So after hearing multiple times, "You should go into business!" and having a nice FB chat with a friend last night, I'm trying to come up with potential business names should I get serious about selling baked goods. How the heck do I come up with a name that isn't taken/used/copyrighted/etc.

Recently someone in my town started a similar business (cupcakes made from organic ingredients, cookies, sweet breads) and the business is called "Sweetness", so I wouldn't really want anything with sweet in the name.

Yes, my name starts with a "K" and would lend itself to all sorts of alliteration and miss-spellings of words like kake, kookie, kupcake, konfection, but I'm not too keen on that idea. I don't want it to have cake, cookie, or cupcake alone in the name since I do all three plus more. Some of my ideas have bakery in the name, but I'm not really a bakery--just a woman with an oven.

Here are a few things that were floating around my head. I need more input, people! That means I need some actual comments!! ;)

• Sugar Rush (although when I said that to hubby, he was like "What is that supposed to mean?"
• Polka Dot Bakery (just because I like polka dots)
• KM Bakery (I see a logo for this like a monogram--my initials used to be KMB. Both my middle and last names start with M)
• C3 (like C "cubed" for cookies, cakes, cupcakes)
• For the Love of Sweets (like "For the love of Pete!")

Of course hubby's helpful input was "Overpriced Baked Goods" to which I modified to "Rolling in the Dough". Get it? Ha ha. I don't think I'd get much business that way. Right now it is all still a pipe dream, but if you can dream it you can believe it, right?

Quiet House

We had to make the hard decision yesterday to put the cat to sleep. After he was diagnosed with renal failure, he seemed to improve a little with extra fluids everyday but he still didn't eat. We tried everything we could to try and get him to eat, but he just had no interest. By the last day or so he was moving very slowly and also was having labored breathing. It was the best thing we could do for him, although it wasn't easy. Of course I was the one who got to take him in the last time.

The girls have done very well with all of it. Once we knew he was sick and that he may not get better, I had checked some books out at the library about having a pet die. Emma knew when she went to school yesterday that we would be taking him in to be put to sleep. Leah was with me (she stayed in the van) but I'm not sure how much she really understood about what was going on. One of the things the vet offers is to have a clay pot with his paw print in it, so I did have them do that so the girls had something to remember him by. Although I'm sure we will remember him everytime we find cat hair (which would probably be everywhere), find a lost whisker, or see the lovely spot on the steps where he thought it was his personal scratching post.

Now the house is very quiet. Rest in peace, Elway, you are missed.

El Sickerino

Remember this furry friend that I usually speak so lovingly about?

Damn Cat (aka Elway)

He hadn't been acting himself last week so we finally took him into the vet to find out he is Sick with a capital S. Poor thing is in renal failure and I now get to add kitty dialysis to my "list of things I never knew I could do but have to do". His condition is chronic so I will get to do it for the rest of his live, however long that may be.

Elway is about 9.5 years old. We got him when we lived in Minnesota and had moved into a house. We had wanted a bengal cat (which are in no way related to wild bengal tigers), but purebreds can be very spendy. We found a gal who was selling "mixed" bengals, meaning the female she wanted to breed got some outside lovin' from a stray cat. For $50 Elway was ours.

Yes, he can be a pain in the ass especially when he "sprays" all over 1/2 our belongings in storage, making them stink to high-heaven and rendering them useless. The puking thing is also very annoying. He is loud and doesn't like company to invade his space (just ask guests who try to use the downstairs bathroom when he is visiting--he will give you an earfull). The last time we had someone take care of him while we were gone, she had to send her husband over because he wouldn't let her in the door. He has broken a few things which include but are not limited to: a lamp, a toilet tank cover, a large shelf, and has ruined parts of the carpet with his scratching. He takes up more than than his share of the bed at night and insists on drinking out of the faucet.

But he is a member of the family and everyone (mostly) loves him. The girls adore him and hubby would be lost without him. He comes from a family of cat lovers. If I had a scanner, I could share one of hubby's senior pictures with the cat. I only know of one other person who is married to a cat-holding senior. Even my sister-in-law who has known hubby for a good 20 years didn't know that about him.

It is hard to see him sick, but hubby doesn't think he is in pain. The poor thing hasn't eaten much of anything in over a week. He is making it down to his litter box, but isn't quite making it in these days. He has perked up some from when we brought him in, but he has definitely slowed down and lost some of his personality. The girls know he is sick and that he may not live much longer.

I don't know what we'll do when he's gone. The house was eerily quiet the day he was gone to the vet. The girls see this as an opportunity for a potential new pet. I'm not so sure about that. ;)