Fall is in full swing around The Green, the week brought Halloween, leaf cleaning and cleaning up the garage to be ready for a car to protect it from the snow.

Monday we started off with a great dinner with friends before the Trick-or-Treaters started coming. And they came in droves. By best guess, we had 600-700 kids flow past our front door. We ran out of candy, twice! We started with 1 large bag of candy, about 100 pieces, that lasted about 20 minutes, the next 100 pieces went faster, and each kid was only getting one piece. I’d had enough, Kyle and I took off to Dollar General and I was determined not to run out again. $28 later, I’d cleaned them out of anything that a kid would remotely want in his candy stash. We made it fine through the rest of the night, and at the end mad someone’s night by telling them to just take the rest so we could go inside because we were so cold. Apparently, our street is “the” street to come to, every kid in the town comes to our street.

When we ran to get candy, the street looked like Mardi Gras, people were everywhere and there wasn’t room for my truck to get through. Then as I looked down the other cross streets in town, I noticed they were like ghost towns, not a child to be found, because they were all standing on my driveway waiting for me to return with more sugary goodness from the Mars company.

Last night, I cleaned most of the leaves up in the back and side yards. Our large sugar maple hasn’t dropped many leaves yet, having only started to change to yellow in the last week or so. The rest of the neighborhood is nearly bare, but our stupid trees are going to hang on until spring probably. I did get a nice sized pile though from the other trees that drop on our yard though. Hopefully after the rain comes through today more will drop and I can get the yard mowed one last time before the snow starts. I gotta remember to plant grass seed too… The front yard is finally starting to get “there” again.

The garage is the last big thing we need to get done before winter arrives. There is just too much junk in there right now, Erin’s car won’t fit and it’s nice to have one car clean when heavy snow and ice come. One day at a time I suppose. I think I just need a dumpster t0 fill up.

Things are busy this time of year, I love this time of year though, I just wish it was bit warmer so we could use the fire pit a few more times.

Ok, so I know, I know, I don’t write often enough, but I am working on that.  Things have been crazy, I have been crazy, but that is life.  Lately my husband and I have been blessed to be trusted to watch a wonderful little girl from time to time, when her mom has to work on the weekend.  So being the person I am, I have been looking for fun little art projects to do with a 20 month old who is to smart for her own good, already.  While going through my Google Reader feed this morning I found a great post on Everyday Beautiful, I have to say, she has one of my favorite blogs, if you haven’t checked it out, you have to.  Anyways, she posted this great little painting project for kids that I just had to share.

So go on…check out Everyday Beautiful, subscribe to her feed and try out some of her way cool ideas and tutorials.

By the way, the above picture if from her post at Everday Beautiful – DIY: Canvas Art With Kids.

Later.

I just want to say, I have a whole new appreciation for all of you out there that are raising a kid on your own.  I don’t know how you manage to do it.  I just watch my cousin for a day every other Saturday and I am still tired.  I am sure it is somewhat different when it is your own and you have been building up endurance from birth, but man, they start walking and I don’t know how you all keep up with them.  My cousins little one has only been walking about a week and man do those little legs move.  She was chasing the dog, climbing on stuff, pulling stuff off shelves, crawling in the dogs crate and giving the dog a heart attack.  Mainly, she was just happy to be able to keep up with the dog I think.  You could always tell where she was at though because if you didn’t hear her little feet thudding on the floor, you could hear her yelling “Pep-pep!” at the top of her lungs, even after she was put down for a nap.  And don’t get me started about the nap.  She did not want to sleep at all, all I wanted to do was rest.  Man that little thing wore me out.    Did I mention that she is fast for only walking for a week.   So, to sum it all up, my hat is off to all you single parents out there, I think there should be a special day just for you all.

Later

Ok, ok…I know…I suck at keeping this thing up to date.   It has been way to long since I last posted, and yes some stuff has happened, but that is life, something happens everyday.  If nothing happened you wouldn’t be living.  For this post I am only going to skim over something and touch on something and then wrap it up and put a calendar reminder in for me to post later.

So, lets get started.   Hawaii was cool, made a really cool new friend that I have been trying to stay in touch with.  She is awesome and has the cutest dog name John Wayne.  How cool is that?  The Pro Bowl was ok, no real injuries of course.  You know how I like to see blood.  I got sun burnt and sick, the flight thing was interesting on the way home because of a major ice storm that shut down a bunch of stuff in Indy.  We ended up flying to Ohio and driving home from there so I could get home and sleep in my own bed, really wasn’t feeling well at all.

After Hawaii we went on the cruise to the Bahamas “Love Like You Mean It” marriage cruise, for Valentine’s day.  It was good we had fun.  I managed to not get sun burnt.  Mike got a little sick, but nothing major.  Meet a lot of nice people and talked to a Vet, really meant a lot to me and I am hoping I helped him as much as he helped me.  Thankfully there were no issues getting home that time.

Since then babies have been born and conceived, no none of them mine.  I am working on a few baby blankets right now, a lady bug, rainbow and a TBD.  I have some other projects in the works too; clothing, quilts, embroidery, painting, new bathroom, to name a few.  Another development was that we ended up having to change one of my meds because it was getting to be to pricey, so I am going through the “find the right dose” game again.  Fun times for me, the ups, the down, the panic attacks, the anxiety issues, the crying, and the plain old emotional roller coaster.  I bet you have never seen a grown, none preg, woman got from zero to psycho in under a minute.  In addition to all that I have been dealing with some other issues too, which I am not going to talk about, but I will acknowledge that they are there and that a select few know about them.

Well, the weather is getting warmer and the skirts are out again.  I have been working out more regularly and trying to get in shape for the mini next year, if you want to join let me know.  For some reason, I finally feel pretty again too.  Oh so pretty.  Yes, I am back to watching West Side Story, what of it.

I am currently reading “The Five Love Languages” with Mike, Ali and David.  I have learned that I am one of the weird ones that have two primary love languages, I am “Words of Affirmation” and “Physical Touch”, go figure.  Normal has never been good enough for me, I have always had to go one step above, so of course I have two primary love languages.  (*sigh* *throw hands up in air*)

On the topic of books, one of my friends that I am going to start calling Barnes and Noble has been pushing me to read a book lately, I think it is “Emotional Intelligence” by Daniel Goleman, of course I could be wrong.  (If you are reading this B&N and that is not the right book, feel free to correct me, this time.)  So, I guess I will add that to the long list of books to read.  My list is seriously getting long, with all the classics, the re-reads, the new books, the novels, the poetry for fun, the books of learning/self discovery and everything else on my list, I am going to be set till I am at least 60.

I have also been getting in touch with old friends lately, I feel like I was once this person that enjoyed going out and hanging with different types of people and I haven’t for awhile now, so…I am trying to get back to it.  So…if you are an estranged friend of mine out there, drop me a line, we will have to talk.

Well, I should really get back to work and get my head out of the clouds, but first a quick sneak peak at the next post, I am thinking of going back to school.  :-)

Later & Luv Ya All.

Muree

Ok, I know it has been a long time.  You are probably thinking that I have forgot about you, but I have not.  Things have just been really crazy.  I mean come on, I am typing this while at work on hold and probably continue on break.  Like I said things have been crazy, but I think Mike and I have grown even closer through it all.

Let’s see, where to start…hmmmm….I think I will leave the topic of the title till the end.  I think I will start with my brother.  My brother is an amazing young man, that does manage to get on my nerves, that is working on rounding up the last of what he needs to go to Guatemala.  I am terrified about him going, but I have to let him go.  It is what he feels God is calling him to do.  I’m not sure how long he will actually be there or when he leaves, I just know he is working on trying to leave before the end of the month.  For some reason I felt better about him going to China all those times then I do about this.  I think it is because he was in a group of students in China and not on his own.  I have a feeling I will have another freak out if he manages to get everything together to go teach English in China for a year.  I think he is wanting to go back to Wuhan where he already has a large group of friends and a few families he now knows quite well.  I hope he can make it to China, he was happy in China.

Now on to my Mom, she is doing well.  Her memory is still slipping a little, if you don’t write stuff down for her she will not remember it.  But, besides that, she is good.  She just had hand surgery on her right hand before Christmas, and the stitches came out this week.  It looks to be healing very nicely.  From what I can tell, it looks like there will be little to no scaring.  That has to do with her Dr. being amazing though.  He is the same Dr. that took care of my brothers multiple knee surgeries, my dad’s one knee replacement and other surgeries on his other knee.  We have known him and his family for a while know.  I was friends with his eldest daughter when I was younger.  She is now married with a child and I think in the mission field in Africa(?).  But back to my mom, she is good.

My dad has been sick for awhile.  He has had an upper respirator infection for some time now and can’t seem to get the cough to go away.  I am going to try to get him to try a chamomile and mint vapor treatment.  If that doesn’t work, I might have to amp it up with a little camphor.  Besides that he is same old Dad.

Mike is doing well.  We put new windows in the house and since then our utilities bill has gone down significantly.  We are working on slowly paying off our debt.  We recently paid off a line of credit and are now working on the next one in our debt snowball (Dave Ramsey reference).  In other news, he has been crazy about Twitter lately.  He had a week off of work between Christmas and New Years and I think he spent the whole time on Twitter.  On the upside he did win a contest that Jim Irsay was having on twitter.  The first to answer the riddle correctly won a trip to Hawai’i to the Pro Bowl.  He is flying us out and taking care to the hotel and tickets to the Pro Bowl.  We are so excited.  I have wanted to go to Hawai’i, well since my parents went when I was a kid.  I can’t believe I am getting Mike to Hawai’i, he use to always say the only way I would get him to Hawai’i would be when they build the bridge and we can drive there.  This is going to be amazing.  I have a feeling he might freak out a little on the plane, but I think if I give him some Dramamine he will be ok.

When we get back from Hawai’i we will have about a week of work, then we will be off to Florida to catch a boat for our cruise of the Bahamas.  I can’t believe we are going to Hawai’i and the Bahama’s I didn’t think I would get Mike to go to either, much less back on a boat.  The last cruise we went on we hit some bad weather and the boat was rocking more then normal and it made him sick, not to mention unable to walk straight down the hallway, it was funny, I had no trouble.  Mike just doesn’t have sea legs.  We will see how he does this time.

In other news my cousin’s little one is turning 1 soon, my friend in Texas his having her third (it was because of another bridesmaid in her wedding that I meet Mike), my friend in Missouri is having her second (she having a girl, her little ladybug), my friend that got married last August that I helped with is having her first (I don’t know what it is yet) and hopefully our other friend couple will be getting engaged soon (I am itching to work on another wedding, I love the behind the scene details).  As for me and Mike we are waiting.  We want to get mostly out of debt and maybe be in a bigger house and defiantly more financially stable.  For now, we are content being able to hand the kids back to their parents at the end of the day, or when they need a diaper change.

Well, I think that is all for now.  I will try to not wait so long for the next post, and yes, I will try to post from Hawai’i and the Bahamas.

Later

P.S. Don and Heather, if you are reading this, please look out for my brother in Guatemala for me.