Are We Done, Now??

The entire month of February I have had at least one child sick. This past week was a real doosy with three throwing up and two with lovely diarrhea. Byron and I each got a touch of it, too, but not very bad. Samuel had the worst of it and lost either 2 or 3 lb that Mr. Skinny sure didn't have to lose. We all finally were well by Fri. evening. I'm so exhausted from this whole month that I really don't know whether I'm coming or going and my thoughts struggle to make sense to me.

My packing came to a screeching halt last Sunday when Samuel was the first to start puking. I just couldn't keep up. I'm trying to get back in the swing of things. Yesterday I got one box packed and Saturday I packed 3 boxes. I don't know if I will ever be able to get this house presentable enough to sell. I'm just going to have to pray for a miracle buyer to come, look, not care and just buy. We can't afford a storage unit and the warehouse where Byron is starting up a metal business doesn't look like a very good option for long term storage of all our items like boxes of books, clothes, dolls and stuffed animals that rodents from the surrounding fields would love to eat and make nests out of. We have an oppressive amount of work to get done before a move can take place and I so often feel confused about just where to even start. If the weather holds and Byron doesn't drive the limo this weekend we will be having a yard sale. We plan to have all three allowed by the city before we move out of the house.

We have had just a few "well" moments during the month. One of those moments was Austin's birthday. Kyle and the boys and Papaw came to our house for a little party and the cousins had a blast playing. It was such a nice day they got to spend a lot of time outside playing. About a week and a half later Michaela and all three kiddos came for a little play date and I got my hair colored at the same time. "Thanks Sis" I had at least 2" of gray at the roots and it was looking really rough. The kids had fun that day too, but they were stuck inside because it was wet and cold.

Our days go much like this...get up, eat, get daddy up, shoo him out the door, start school, put two in front of the TV and one on the floor in my sight, repeatedly say "leave Samuel alone and let him play", feed Samuel and put him to bed, fix lunch and eat, get V back on school and have projects for the other two to work on, put the other two in separate rooms and keep doing school, put the other two back in front of the TV and keep doing school, eventually finish school and get Samuel up to eat and play, try to figure out what to do for supper, all the while constantly doing loads of laundry, sweeping, vacuuming, doing dishes, changing diapers, wiping noses, picking up messes or following around the one who is being told to pick up their things, wiping up the toilet seat from little boy splatter, and the list goes on. Right now, I'm sure I should be doing at least one of the things on this list of daily activities.

Byron is now operating out of a warehouse where he can sort his metals to scrap one kind at a time and be able to get top dollar for that particular metal. He plans to open and operate a small scrap yard himself where he will by aluminum, copper and a couple of other metals. He is quite excited about this and I really hope it works out the way he thinks it will. If this succeeds, then I think he will have finally found the perfect job for himself and something he can do for years to come. Until the business takes off, we have to figure out how to come up with the rental payment for our half of the building, but at least all that metal stuff isn't in our yard and house anymore. {BIG SMILE}

Random thought...my kids say some of the funniset things and I wish I was together enough to write them all down. I always forget by bedtime which is when I thought I'd jot those kind of things down in a notebook that I'm keeping.

I Spoke Too Soon

Well, Samuel does seem to feel a whole lot better, but he still is not eating like he should. He's already below the bottom of the weight charts and sure didn't need to lose weight. I hope he starts taking in more calories soon.

After getting a full night's sleep on Wed. I thought I was home free. Yeah, right. About midnight last night we discovered Leah was running fever. She'd been coughing off and on all day, but I just hoped we could get by without anyone else getting sick. I was up very late because of her.

Then once I got to sleep a loud noise woke me up. The police helicopter was flying around our neighborhood from about 2:30 - 4 AM, shining it's spotlight all around and making a huge amount of noise. I bet our lovely neighbor 3 doors down was calling the police dept. telling them to stop making so much noise. That's just the kind of person she is. I've heard her yelling at the cops before to shut off their sirens after they had jumped out of their cars to pursue criminals on foot. O.K. here's the way I think...I'd rather them catch the bad guys before they got in my yard or house than have them take the time to turn off their sirens. She's a REAL WEIRD COOKIE.

Oh, one more thing, Victoria and Austin have started coughing some as the day has progreessed. I just hope I'm not up in the middle of the night with them coming down with fevers too.

Progressing Slowly But Surely

Things are progressing, though rather slowly. Byron and his dad got a warehouse today out in Forney. Byron can move his trailer, metal bins and all his other stuff out there. We will also move boxes out there as we try to sell our house, so this place will look less cluttered and more appealing. We have a for sale sign in our front yard and have listed the house ourselves in several locations on line. Once we have the clutter gone and the place easy (yeah, right) to clean up in a hurry we will list it in the paper and really push to draw in prospective buyers to look at the house. Hopefully, we are pricing it low enough to move it fast once we get people through the door. It does need interior paint, carpet (if the spots won't come out in the LR), screens on most windows (didn't have any screens when we bought it) and one garage door needs fixed. (The door that fell on me just two days before my 2nd miscarriage...no way to tell if that is what caused it.) So the house is in reasonable repair, just needs some little things done to it. Enough to give someone a great deal, but they could move in immediately and live with it if they needed to.

I have been set back by sickness. Samuel started running fever last Fri. at 2 AM and I finally had to take him to the dr. on Tues. He just wasn't getting better and then started acting like his ear hurt. Thankfully he didn't have the flu, but it was some sort of virus. The ear was a secondary infection and there may have been a bit of a throat infection, too. The dr. didn't check his throat because she said the same med would be used for both and there was no need to "torture" him with further exam. Now nearly 36 hrs after starting the Amoxicillin he is fever free and slept all night last night. YAY!!!

It was funny or cute, when I brought Samuel home from the dr. Leah came running up and touched his face and said, "Oh, Sammy, I was so worried about you! You be O.K.?"

My brother and sil just had triplets and I'm dying to go see them. It's just killing me to know they are a week old and all I've been able to do is see pictures. With sickness all around me, I can't got visit and carry germs in on my person. "Tyler, Whitney, Hannah your Aunt Lisa loves you and so does Uncle Byron and your cousins. We pray for you to keep getting bigger and stronger every day so you can go to your own home with your mommy and daddy. I'll see you as soon as I can."

Now I'm off to get back to school with Victoria. If I don't stay right on top of her, she starts to piddle around and can make school last till late in the evening. I like to try and get school done while Samuel naps.

We're Out of Here!!!!!

Yes, it is what it sounds like. We are putting a for sale sign on our house and adds on the Internet and are first going to try and sell it ourselves. We'll let it go, too. Anyone want to buy our house?? We want out of Garland as soon as possible. No, we don't know where we are going, but it will be un-incorporated and unrestricted and will have a few acres and storage. The kids will get a puppy (Byron will get a puppy) and eventually, Mommy will get a horse ( BIG SMILE). They animals are a bit down the road, but the move is imminent.

There was a time when I had a huge opinion about where we live, location, house, etc. Now I just don't care. We just need to get away from the evil woman three doors down and the city code compliance harassment. We are not suited to city life. I do hope we can find a place where the nearest neighbor is at least 200+ yards away. That would be heaven to me.

I'm beginning to pack everything we don't need. Every time I get a box I fill it up, label it and stack it in the corner. All boxes must be relatively small because when it comes to moving day we very well may be doing it all by ourselves. Whee!! I don't care, though. We may have to find some help with some of the bigger furniture items, but really, I think we can do most if not all of it alone. I'm actually strangely excited about this whole prospect. I never thought I would feel this way.

It's just a matter or time now. If you read this please pray that everything will fall into place quickly and that God will lead us clearly so that we know exactly what we should do each step of the way.

Just a Note

The Christmas tree is down. Dad helped me take it down when he and Mom brought the kids home last eve. I have so much open space in my living room now, YAY! The kids love the space for spinning in circles and making themselves dizzy. I remember when my brothers and I used to make ourselves dizzy and then lay down on the floor to watch the room spin. It was such fun. If I tried that now I think I'd get sick.

Now I'm going to see if I can sneak in a short nap before we have to leave for church again.

Always Busy

A couple of days ago I was out front helping Byron with some stuff and our next door neighbor came over for a few minutes. She came to talk to Byron, but when she was through she and I stood there talking for awhile. I ended up feeling quite encouraged after our talk. She said she tells her friends about me and tells them I'm super woman (WOW!). She's just amazed at me having 4 children and all so young and well behaved. She just goes on and on about how good my kids are. Now I know she doesn't see everything, but she has seen them misbehave before and still thinks they are wonderful children. She said a lot more than that, but this was a summation of our conversation. I came back in the house with my heart just swelling with joy that our efforts and prayer are producing a result in our children that is recognized by others.

My in-laws have even commented several times lately about how certain behaviors in certain ones of the children have been greatly improved. Believe me, to get encouraging words from them is a huge thing. They also know to always tell us if they see, hear or experience anything involving one of our children that needs our attention. They have been getting better and better about doing just that and at the same time have had less instances where they have needed to "tell on the kids".

I've been so busy lately, there just seems to be no end in sight. I can hardly wait until the kids can help more with chores. Everyone has their little jobs that they do, but I either have to stand over them while it's done, or come back later and redo the job. They are learning, though, and once jobs are mastered I think my load will get easier. For now...we just keep plugging away.

I'm doing load after load of laundry today. I have to get everything clean before tonight and my couch is barely visible below the piles of clean clothes. I despise folding and putting away clothes. It has to be done, but is so boring and time consuming.

I'm really looking forward to this weekend. My mom is keeping my three older kids Fri. night and most of the day Sat. I'll be able to spend all day Sat. focusing on getting our tax info together. I have loads of receipts and medical statements and other things to get in order and recorded. That way when our W-2's and 1099's arrive, I can get our taxes filed. It's so hard to get paper work done when there are constant interruptions. I can hardly express to the full extent how grateful I am for the day and evening I'm getting to get all these things in order.

Here's a laugh...my Christmas tree is still up. All the decorations are put away, but I can't get the the tree box by myself and Byron has been so busy that he hasn't gotten around to helping me. Hope I get it down before too long.

Christmas etc...

Here are just a few random pictures from 3 of our 4 Christmas celebrations. They are in no particular order.

Let's see...first I have to record something funny I witnessed. Austin was "teaching" Leah how to play Duck, Duck, Goose and was using Samuel as a player in the game. First, he explained to Leah that Samuel had to be a duck because he can't run yet. Then as Leah was going back and forth, "duck, duck, duck, duck" Austin said, "Alright, already, now goose me!" I busted out laughing and they both couldn't figure out what was so funny. Of course, I didn't want to explain, so I just told them I was glad they were having so much fun playing together.

The year has started off better than it ended for me. My spirits are on the rise and we are making plans to "get out of Dodge". Don't really know when it will happen, but at least making plans gives me hope. I used to have dreams of my kids getting to grow up close to cousins and them all being best friends/buds, but everyone is already so spread out and contact is going to be even less now that some things have changed logistically. I would be tempted to try and move to a place closer to where some of the cousins are, but we can't live our lives chasing family around just to keep our kids near relatives. I wish we could. I'm missing everyone already and my kids play pretend that they are getting to be with cousins. Unfortunately, the direction we will be more likely to afford property and housing is the opposite direction of where everyone else lives. I don't know what is going to happen or where we will end up, but we have each other and can be happy with that.

There are still holidays, birthdays and the occasional "just because" to get together. I'm figuring we'll see family about once every 4 to 6 weeks.

I'm back to riding my recumbent bike every night. I've worked back up to 30 min. and my goal is an hour a day. If I get to an hour a day and am careful what I eat, I expect to start seeing a difference in my weight and size soon.

My Christmas tree is on it's way down. The ornaments and tree skirt are boxed up and going to their closet tonight. Hopefully, Byron can give me a hand to get the tree pulled apart and packed tomorrow. I put it up myself, but I just don't think I can get this monster torn down on my own.

Boy is this ever a random group of thoughts. Is there anything else I can throw in here? Guess not, at least not right now. I've come back to this post about ten times trying to get it finished. Maybe that should be my hint that I'm just too busy right now and need to stop.