Publix's Chocolate Trinity ice cream should be outlawed, well that would really suck, but it's that good. Yesterday, I even convinced a stranger in the ice cream aisle to give it a go.
Sometimes it seems the least athletic people wear athletic clothes the most.
Sometimes things really do fall into place quite nicely.
I married a REALLY GOOD man.
I want a new Gator shirt, something between the loose free student tshirts and the bejeweled later in life button ups. Maybe a nice fitted tshirt.
It was a lot easier to buy Gator clothing when we lived in Gainesville.
It's really hard for me to spend money. Even when I have it to spend or worse- free money on giftcards.
I'm proud to say reading to the kids before bed has become an almost week night tradition now.
I wish I could fix the people I love, but don't kid myself to think I can.
Brown cardboard boxes have a strange kinda stinky odor.
I want to always remember LG calling Gatorade "alligator juice"
I will miss the park in this neighborhood and our backyard lake view, but not much else.
What is it about moving to a new house that makes us want all new/different furniture?
I should have helped more when R moved, it's a big job.
Tonight is our last night in this house of 16 months.
I have a good good life and am very happy where I am in it.
For those of you not up to date on our housing saga, here's the somewhat abbreviated version...
We've been renting since we got back from London. Jason's parent's home burned down in Sept 2009 leaving a lovely swimming pool, driveway and gorgeous lot in a great neighborhood. We decided to build on the lot and proceeded with getting house plans and a builder. We were about a week away from closing on the building loan and breaking ground when we hit a legal issue with the lot. Down the drain went that dream and invested money.
We decided to stay put and wait on legal issue. Fourth day of school we find an amazing house at an even more amazing price in another school zone. It's a short sale and have seen poor Niki & Bill's short sale saga so we make an offer but don't hold our breath.... that was 32 days ago. Yesterday we closed and got the keys. Seems building on the great lot wasn't meant to be.
I've found a waiver where the girls should be able to finish the school year where they are and then start the next school year at Wilson, where I taught and Jason, Amy, Niki, Bill and Mike all attended. We're all Wilson Stingers at heart :)
We're working on painting the girls' rooms this weekend and look to be moved in the next week or so.
We're really excited to have a real honest to goodness home since we've been temporary since Dec 2008! We miss feeling settled and having people over. We hope to host lots of you over the coming years!
Here are some photos from the housing inspection when the previous owners still lived there. Girls are totally thrilled they left the trampoline.
I heard this song on the radio today and really listened to the words.
It made me think of Valla, a lot.
Now I can't hear it without crying :)
Just The Way You Are
by Bruno mars.
Oh her eyes, her eyes Make the stars look like they're not shining Her hair, her hair Falls perfectly without her trying
She's so beautiful And I tell her every day
Yeah I know, I know When I compliment her She wont believe me And its so, its so Sad to think she don't see what I see
But every time she asks me do I look okay I say
When I see your face There's not a thing that I would change Cause you're amazing Just the way you are And when you smile, The whole world stops and stares for awhile Cause girl you're amazing Just the way you are
Her nails, her nails I could kiss them all day if she'd let me Her laugh, her laugh She hates but I think its so sexy (Not THAT part :) She's so beautiful And I tell her every day
Oh you know, you know, you know Id never ask you to change If perfect is what you're searching for Then just stay the same
So don't even bother asking If you look okay You know I say
When I see your face There's not a thing that I would change Cause you're amazing Just the way you are And when you smile, The whole world stops and stares for awhile Cause girl you're amazing Just the way you are
The way you are The way you are Girl you're amazing Just the way you are
When I see your face There's not a thing that I would change Cause you're amazing Just the way you are And when you smile, The whole world stops and stares for awhile Cause girl you're amazing Just the way you are
Fortunately, these are on auto pilot and require very little attention from me.
Tom sent his granddaughters live caterpillars. :) For the past week or so, the little guys have been eating their way to their calling. Now all 10 are hanging and beginning the metamorphosis process.
I've done this same observation with classes when I was teaching and I find it absolutely fascinating each and every time. I am however, always somewhat disappointed to see them crawling around and then hours later they seem to have been replaced by unrecognizable chrysalises. HOW DO THEY DO THAT SO QUICKLY?! I would love to just sit and watch how it happens.
I told N i had a surprise for her today. I went to have lunch with her at school. While I was sitting there she asked if she still gets a surprise when she gets home. Guess I'm not that good of a surprise.
But later she told me, "mom, when you came to have lunch with me, you made the rest of my day SO good."
Remember this cute little guy? Isabella, the mouse. We gave her to Natalie on Sunday Aug 22nd to celebrate her 6th birthday! Just 6 short days later, she became lost.
It started with Natalie and her friends playing with the mouse and getting a little too comfortable with her running around her room. All of the sudden I hear, "I can't find her!"
We looked around for her and out of the corner of my eye, I see a flash in the bathroom. Nat and I try to corner her with the door closed but she disappeared! Seems there is an unseen gap in the the base of the cabinet underneath the sink. At least we knew where she was. So we googled "how to catch a mouse ALIVE!" and constructed this trap...
The idea is she's enticed by the smell of peanut butter, follows the trail up the ramp and jumps into peanut butter bliss where she's trapped until we retrieve her from the bottom of the bucket. Sounded good right?!
No sign of the mouse, at all!
Monday afternoon our cat is meowing very loudly at the kitchen stove. I removed the bottom drawer and low and behold, there's Isabella! So she's not been in the bathroom like we thought.
Thinking I could stick something back there to make her run out, we set up towels to try and contain her. The girls were so excited.
All the damn mouse did was crawl up into the housing of the stove and oven. Not sure whether to use the stove to cook dinner or not, I ordered pizza. At this point I've gone from concerned about the mouse, to very aggravated about the mouse.
Finally Tuesday, I put the stove back together and figure we're just going to have to retrieve a dead mouse from behind some appliance once she finally starves to death. I'm not happy about this and even more aggravated I BROUGHT THIS MOUSE INTO MY HOUSE and therefor invited this drama and hassle!
Through out the week, Princess our cat, teases me with false signs of spotting the mouse.
Friday afternoon rolls around and it's now been 5 solid days without seeing her. I'm loading the dishwasher and out of the corner of my eye, see the mouse running from the dining room into the kitchen and under the dishwasher.
I figure she's got to be starving as she's been without food or water for SIX days. I put a piece of her food smeared with peanut butter next to another unknown gap in the kick plate part of the cabinet and wait. Out pops her head! She IS hungry.
N and I set up a plan where I watch for her to pop out and then N grabs her. Of course the mouse is too fast and now wise to our plan. We regroup and Val is the lookout and I'm ready with a clear plastic shoebox inches from the ground. She won't come out. V and I have this silent exchange where I look questioning to her, "Is she there?" Val shakes her head no. This continues for a full 5 minutes when finally V's eyes light up and she smiles with excitement. Finally I see the tip of her nose approaching the food. A little more patience and her whole body is under the shoe box. I quickly slam it down and got her! I don't even remember how I got her out from under the box, but we did.
I don't think I've been that excited about an accomplishment in a long while! How she survived with 3 cats and 1 dog while moving through out the house is amazing to me!
We now have new rules as to who and how Isabella can be handled. I really hope that's the last time I'm part of a mouse hunt, but somehow know it probably isn't.
