Life with Littles

Black Friday is over...

I hope that all of you got what you were looking for this Black Friday.  I was able to get almost everything that I wanted.  The littles have been enjoying their new trampoline for the last two days.  It is a Christmas present, but we know that they won't really be able to enjoy it in January since it is too cold so DaddyLittle set it up yesterday.  Although I hate to say it, I think he was right that it was a better choice than a Wii.  But, I still want a Wii.  For now I am just enjoying my new laptop and my new camera.  The camera is the Kodak Easy Share that was on sale for $150 at Wal-Mart.  I love it!  I am going to spend the next couple of days trying to learn what all the buttons do.  The pictures are great though. 

I had hoped to have most of my Christmas decorations up by now but thanks to a stomach virus I didn't get much of anything done.  Hopefully I will be feeling better by tomorrow.

I can't wait for this semester to be over.  I have never been so ready for a break in my life!  Only 2 more weeks to go!  I am working on my list of everything that I want to get done in my short break.  I will have 8 days off before we go to Disney World, then I will go back to school the day after we get back.  That means I only have 8 days to get everything done around the house.  That is not much time!!!!!  I will really have to get busy to get it all done.  I am already trying to work on some of it in my spare time.  Today in between sick time I worked on my Master Closet.  I got rid of a lot of clothes, so I feel like I at least accomplished a little bit.  Hopefully I will feel up to getting something else done tomorrow.

Seriously????

I can't believe it has really been over 2 months since I posted!  Yikes!  Well I guess I better catch you all up on everything.

I am STILL in nursing school.  This is honestly the worst semester ever.  Not only that but I have convinced myself that it will be a good idea to take 19 credit hours next semester.  Yes, I am a little insane apparently.  I was also nominated by our faculty for the Missouri League of Nursing  Leadership Conference.  That is a huge honor since they only select one student and an alternate from each school to go.  I will talk more about that later.  They also nominated me for Who's Who.  I am truly honored!

Little #1 is currently taking a Hunter Education Course so that she can hunt with DaddyLittle this year.  She has also be really busy riding horses with grandpa.

Little #2 finished soccer.  She has decided that she will play soccer in the spring, but this will be the last year.  She wants to start playing volleyball instead. 

Little #3 has kept me very busy with doctor's appointments and pre-op teachings to attend.  She was scheduled to have a tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy yesterday.  However, the place they planned on doing the surgery is not covered in Daddy's insurance network.  So, last minute I got the call that the surgery will be Monday instead.  I had already rearranged my schedule so that put a big kink in all of that.  Oh well, gotta roll with the flow, right?

Little #4 has kept me very busy washing sheets (are you seeing a theme of littles keeping their mother very busy) because he has been throwing up at night.  After I heard him coughing last night it finally dawned on me that he has probably developed nighttime asthma.  Since he has a history of severe eczema his changes were really high of developing asthma.  His sister and I both have asthma as well.  Other than that he seems to be doing well.

I think that is the update on what is going on in the house of littles.

So tired.

I can seriously not believe how tired I am.  This is just not fair.  I am supposed to be fully rested since I have been on break from school.  My house is also supposed to be spotless.....yeah right!  I can't believe that I have to start classes tomorrow.  Where exactly did the summer go? 

On another note, we have discovered that we can now add another allergen to John's growing list.  Horses.  This is a bad allergy too, complete with swollen eyes, rash, itching and wheezing.  Great, we are starting with the asthma problems now.  I can't wait until hubby's insurance kicks in and I can get him to the doctor for some new meds.  Poor baby!  He just sounds awful.  As an asthma sufferer I can totally relate to how miserable you feel when you can't breathe. 

Preschool Olympics

There is a wonderful blog that I love to read called, The Motherload.  It is written by the founder of MomAdvice and it is a great site.  One of my favorite things about the blog is that she posts a Notebook  of interesting things that she has found on the internet.  There are a lot of crafts, recipes and other family oriented projects.  Yesterday Amy announced a giveaway .  All you have to do is complete on of the notebook projects and post about it on your blog.  Then you are entered to win a Flip Ultra camera.  John has been at home without his siblings since they started school last week, so I picked a project that we could do while they were gone.  In comes the Preschool Olympics that were featured in the 08-07-08 Notebook .  We cut foam plates and I set out a water bottle to see if he could do Ring Toss.  It was a little hard at first because the plates are so lightweight.  He quickly learned, however, just where to sit and just how to toss to get them all on the bottle.  Here are a few pictures of the efforts.

We also had a ball toss to add to the fun.

Thanks Amy  for issuing the challenge!  And thanks to another Amy for posting the original idea!

I was a slacker

All day yesterday I did not accomplish very much.  I had such a great time just organizing my digital photos and making some digital scrapbook pages.  It was great!  Sometimes you just have to take a little time off and have some fun.  The 3 older littles went to school (it was the first day back), and John went to the sale barn with daddylittle.  In all the quiet I just took some downtime.  I have to get back on track today though.  I still have a lot to do before I head back to the books on the 25th. 

Just to give you something to look at, here is Miss Smarty on the 1st day of 2nd grade.

Menu Plan Monday

For more meal plan ideas visit Organizing Junkie.

Monday- Beef Enchiladas, Cheesy Mexican Rice and Green Salad.

Tuesday- Pizza Pick-up

Wednesday- Savory Sandwich Ring (look for recipe on Tuesday)

Thursday- Meatloaf, mashed potatoes, green beans

Friday-  Grill Night

Saturday- Chicken Strip Salad

Sunday- Looking for a new recipe to try!

The littles start back to school this week, and hubby is starting a new schedule so it is going to be a strange week.  I guess we will see how it goes.

Progress is being made

I am so glad that progress is finally being made around my house.  A perk of the 100+ degree weather is that my husband wants to stay inside.  This gives me the perfect opportunity to get a few things checked off the "honey-do" list.  At the top of that list was the need for new drawer runners on drawers in my scrapbook room and in Miss Smarty's room.  Miss Smarty's room has a wonderful hand- me- down bedroom set that is so perfectly cute.  The only problem was the drawers did not work well.  They were using a glide system that was broken on almost every drawer.  So, daddylittle went to the hardware store and the problem is now fixed.  YEAH!  Miss Smarty can now use the drawers without it being a big problem for her. 

Apparently in my scrapbook room I had another problem.  When we finished the room (you can go HERE to view pics) I used cheap cabinets to finish it.  Those cheap cabinets had a really shotty system for the drawers.  Which meant the weight of my scrapbook stuff broke the drawers.  This really messed up the appearance of my lovely room.  So, daddylittle fixed those yesterday too!  What a man!

Today, we are going to continue working our way through the house.  I am getting rid of some of the stuff that just somehow gets missed when you are right in the middle of life as a student nurse with 4 littles to keep up with.  I just love the feeling of accomplishment as I get to check all these projects off my list!

I love yard sales.

That about sums it up.  You just never know what you are going to find when you go to one.  I was told to go to a yard sale yesterday because I would find a lot of cute clothes for Miss Smarty.  So I did.  And I did.  Find cute clothes that is.  Lots of cute clothes.  Most were Gymboree and many still had the tags on them.  Miss Smarty loves to wear skorts and I hit the motherload of skorts at this sale.  Some she won't be able to wear until spring, but I can hold them until then.  Anyway, after I got home last night she tried some of them on and I discovered that she could wear the smaller size (I had passed up some items of this size because I thought they would be too little).  So, I went back today to see if anything was left in that size.  Well, I found a few things, and some I had missed yesterday.  They had also put out some new things.  One of which was a box of K'nex I walked past, but then it caught the corner of my eye.  It ended up being well worth what I paid for it.  The littles played with it all afternoon.  Then when daddy got home he played with them too.  I think it might have been the best $1.50 I have ever spent!

Today was a good day....

It was busy, but good.  First, all the girls went to get new haircuts.  As you can see Miss Smarty got a brand new 'do, look at all that hair on the floor.

Then we headed straight to the waterpark for some summer fun!

It was a wonderful day!  Hope yours was just as good.

It is that time of year....

This project has been on my mind for a few days, but since it is the small thing over at Home Sanctuary I decided to get it done today.  Organize the back to school supplies.  It wasn't until I pulled the lists to look at them that I realized I will now have one in high school, one in middle school, and one in elementary.  Where does the time go? 

I do have one complaint about the school list.  My high schooler is supposed to have 3 2" binders and one 1" binder.  Now I love binders as much as the next person, probably more depending on who the next person is.  But, how in the world are they supposed to fit all those binders plus books in a locker?  Have they even considered this?  And they need a flash drive too.  Why not cut out some of the paper and use the flash drive instead?  Just a thought.