Well, here I am at 2 in the morning with a fussy baby in my lap listening to Savage Garden. The perfect ending to a perfect day. NOT The last couple of days have been super busy, and I'm still nowhere near where I should be in the packing task. I did accomplish getting most of the kitchen (barring food items) packed up but it still looks cluttered. And all other rooms are still a mess. It seems no matter how fast I put something into a box, a small child pulls it right back out. And forget getting rid of something when they're around. I can't even kick James outside to get him out of my hair. I don't dare with the roofers everywhere, especially with them throwing stuff off of the roof with no caution. Granted, there is safety barriers up everywhere so people stay outside the perimeter but I have found several bits of shingles and other waste outside the perimeter where James could easily get into it and get hurt. I did break down and get some movies at the library to help keep them out of my hair. All other movies are packed except a few that I may have missed (I am so tired of Veggie Tales). So although I hate doing it, I can plunk them down in front of Spongebob tomorrow and perhaps get an hour of peace and a couple of boxes filled.

Besides that, the biggest hurdle is actually finding a place to put the darn things. Storage is full (the trundle bed we bought for Deedee took care of that) and I can't start stacking boxes up outside because of the darn roofers. So having to move boxes around to get the work done is extremely annoying. I really need to get the extra room done and then perhaps I can just stack boxes in there as I fill them and then not have to worry about it. Perhaps I'll fill a small travel bag of clothes for each child, enough for the next week, and then I wouldn't have to worry about getting to the dressers either.

Yesterday, I rode to Ross to buy new sheets for the kids. Carey and I felt it was a needed treat for them. Deedee especially. She will be moving into her first big girl bed in the new unit so we're making it as special as possible. She was very excited over the butterfly set she found. Even James got in on it the excitement and picked a pirate set for himself (what else? :D ) and an animal train set for our little Monkey. I also found a cool new shower caddy, a new shower curtain, a metal dustpan and a large wicker chest. In our current unit we have shower doors but the new one needs a curtain. We also needed a new caddy because the one we have is made specifically to go over shower doors. I'm hoping that it will fit over the bathroom door in the place. The extra storage space will come in handy. I was appalled to learn that there is no linen closet in the new place. I already put my sheets and blankets in large chests, that still left no home for my towels. So I was excited to find the chest. Of course, I misjudged the size and it was a bit big for the cargo space on my bike trailer. I got a lot of odd looks with that hanging out on my way home. I've probably misjudged the amount of space that I have in mind also. Bleh. Carey is teasing me about the dustpan I bought. It has a castle painted on it and the phrase "Queen of the Castle" and the matching hand broom has gems on the handle. LOL, I love it.

Deedee has been very funny and precocious lately. Yesterday, she got to wear her first pair of "big girl" earrings. Carey found a pair of ghosts on french hooks that I had stashed in the medicine cabinet on some long ago forgotten day and put them on her. It was so funny watching her shake her head in front of the mirror. She was quite disappointed when we took them off but I was afraid that she would roll on one or get it caught in something and have it yanked out of her ear while she slept. Her new favorite skill is jumping. It's almost all she ever does and she looks so cute. She's getting more skilled everyday but her movements are still jerky and uneven.

James thought it would be fun to cut his own hair today. I managed to save one side and the back, but the other side still looks decidedly chopped. Sigh......... Ah, well. He doesn't have anyone to impress and no pictures are coming up, so I'm not too worried.

I felt very stupid today. Yesterday, I was going to vacuum before leaving for Ross and my group. So I get everything picked up, haul the vacuum out, plug it in, and it turns on but isn't sucking up a darn thing. So, instead of sitting down with to take a look, I just leave since I was already late. I figured Carey would take a look at it. He finally gets around to it today, plugs in it turns it on, and then thinks he solved the problem. The rat had thought I meant I couldn't turn it on, so he was teasing me that I should have checked the plug until I reminded him that it wasn't sucking. So he sat down with it, turned it over, and....... pulled out a damn doll dress that had gotten stuck in the roller. Sigh..... I am glad it was only that though. I was fantasizing scenario's of how I'd explain to my mother in law how I broke her $200 vacuum and what I planned to do to fix it. Heh

As usual, we're behind on the bills, but perhaps something will come up. I rescheduled James' party from the first to the eighth. Not only was it more affordable then, but hopefully we'll have our food stamps by then. They always get messed up when it's time for re certification and they're usually at least a week late, and once two months. And we messed up this month. Neither of us thought to leave some in reserve for next month if stuff got messed up so we're having to make things stretch pretty far. Of course, the one good thing is that we're going through the reserves in the cupboards (this needed to be done anyway, stuff is starting to get out of date) so there will be less to move. Hah, hah.

James chose two new fish for his tank. We have packed the large 10 gallon hex we bought him last year for his birthday and are using only a small 1 gallon at this time. Charlie the ADF, Opi the guppy and now Stan & Ollie all make their home in it. I'm not sure what Stan and Ollie (Carey named them) are, but they're some kind of small sucker fish similar to a plecostamus. We had originally gone to replace the plecostamus but chose against it when we decided to pack the big tank up instead and there just isn't enough room for one of those guys in only 1 gallon of water. Instead, James picked out some really cute little buggers that are only supposed to get up to about 3-4 inches and were recommended for a small tank but for the life of me, I can't remember what they were called. :(