Found this photo on my phone, it was one I thought I’d lost but there it was… A great memory of a great day near the end of summer. It doesn’t get any better than swinging at sunset at Lake Michigan.
And while winter hasn’t fully hit us yet, I’m already looking forward to the warm days (and memories) to come. Both here and in Australia next month (that makes it seem like ages from now – ha). I love my life with boys.
Posted in Life in general
So, our office is moving locations in a week… I’m the only full-time person in our office, plus I’m a partner so it means along with doing my regular job, my mom job and my life “stuff,” I’m also the main move coordinator.
1. When you’re downsizing from 1,900 to 1,300 square feet, purging is a must.
2. Related to the above, if you find things you haven’t used since you moved to your current space 10 years before this, you can safely THROW IT AWAY.
3. Even if it doesn’t look like it, you are a pack rat.
4. Office supplies and books take up a whole lot of boxes.
5. You reach a point in packing where you just think, we can leave that here, or consider inviting the public in to help themselves.
6. Shredding paper is quite relaxing and mind-numbing.
7. Coordinating the logistics of a simple move can be a headache and a half. So when your dryer decides to throw a fit, you buy a new washer/dryer set online without even comparison shopping because the price is right and you don’t have to leave your home. If someone has an easy solution to any problem I have right now, I will totally take them up on their solution – you’ve been warned.
8. Moving during the holiday season is good from a business standpoint because your clients don’t typical start projects during the holiday season.
9. Just because clients don’t typically start projects during the holidays, doesn’t mean they won’t and you will question your sanity in making the decision to move at all when you are starting three new projects in the week before your move (but then you will remind yourself that the ultimate cost-savings make it all worthwhile; also, you start talking to yourself a lot as a coping mechanism).
10. Other things must be sacrificed because all you think about is the move and the logistics of the move… therefore your creativity (and free time) when it comes to blogging is taken over by the move. Sorry…
This post is linked to Oh Amanda’s Top Ten Tuesday.
Posted in Life in general, Top Ten Tuesday
I’m very remiss in reviewing photos on my camera, but I downloaded some tonight and found these lovelies from a visit with my Chicago roomie, Andrea, and her family over Thanksgiving weekend. Aren’t our kids just so cute?
Elena and Liam hit it off while Elise and Jack were playdough buddies.
This photo of our hubbies (I met her husband, Jimmy, at the exact same time I met Andrea when we all spent six weeks in Kazakhstan during the summer of 1998) and the kiddos. It makes my heart happy.
Everyone looks cute as a reindeer…
Including me
A good time was definitely had by all. Even though Liam was initially disappointed to find out he’d be hanging out with a girl, he found out that Elena liked playing Legos and Star Wars on the Wii so he thought she was the coolest. He is still asking to go back and play with his new friend. We’ll have to make that happen again sooner, rather than later!
Posted in Friendship, Life in general
Apparently the dryer got jealous that I was talking about another major appliance yesterday because it decided to freak out and take up smoking last night when I ran it. It is kaput. So sad, especially since the washer was the one we thought was going to die first since it has been leaking a mystery fluid for the past year (but still running so we just gave it a makeshift diaper and called it good). So we bought a new washer and dryer set last night that will be delivered tomorrow – not exactly the plan, but what can you do, with two boys and a husband who wears three outfits a day (at home, at work and working out), a working washer and dryer are kind of necessary and since I bought them together, I saved $200 and another 5% for using my Sears card so it was almost like I was getting them free, if free = a chunk of change.
[Aside: Liam is playing the Wii at the moment (Star Wars Lego game), all by himself, and on of the characters shot at him and he yelled, “Dude, just stop it and chill out!” Makes me chuckle, he does.]
1. What is your favorite Christmas cookie?
My favorite Christmas treat is homemade peppermint patties. Simon’s favorite is the baklava I make once a year. I guess neither one of us is into cookies, per se. And we both love Chex mix equally, though he has to have his special mix with just Chex cereals and nothing else.
2. What’s your favorite holiday movie & why?
Holiday Inn. I just love the music and the dancing and any movie with both Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire.
3. Is there a gift that you bought for your kids that you wish you hadn’t after they opened it?
Anything that makes an obnoxious amount of noise, but since Liam’s first Christmas I’ve learned to avoid those so usually I’m happy with the gifts we’ve given them. If we’re going to talk about regret, I wish I’d never given them a chicken nugget, but then, what would Jack ever eat?
4. What is the messiest room in your house right at this moment?
The whole house. It would be more accurate to say what the cleanest room in my house is, and even that I’d have difficulty pinpointing… but after some thought I’d go with the downstairs bathroom.
5. What is the furthest you have driven for the holidays?
Just after college my parents and went to Texas for Christmas – the one and only time we haven’t had Christmas Eve at their house so that’s the furthest I’ve driven. I’m not too adventurous when it comes to Christmas travel. And though you didn’t ask about flying… the furthest I’ve ever traveled for Christmas was when we went to Australia.
Linking up with Mama M for Five Question Friday!Posted in Five Question Friday, Life in general
Simon and I play something I’ve started calling dishwasher roulette (at least in my head – in reality, I don’t think Simon knows we’re playing this game). Along with having an indicator light next to the word “clean” on the outside of our dishwasher, the other way you know the dishwasher has just run through a cleaning cycle is when you open it, you hear the door to the compartment that holds the cleaning tab audibly “pop” open. Because of our schedules, we’ve gotten into the habit of running the dishwasher at the end of our “parenting shift” leaving it so the other parent comes home to clean dishes in an unemptied dishwasher. It’s easy to ignore the clean dishes and avoid having to put them away until you have to open the dishwasher and hear that popping noise. Once it’s opened, it won’t “pop” again and then the other person knows you’ve open the dishwasher full of clean dishes but haven’t put them away. I personally feel guilty if I don’t put them away once I’ve heard that pop so I avoid opening the dishwasher unless I have to (ignorance is bliss) and thus avoid hearing the telltale pop (hense the dishwasher roulette – though not nearly so life-ending). Simon does not feel this same measure of guilt if his simply pulling the clean dishes out that he needs to use and shutting it again is any indication. Like a good little Dutch girl, I feel the guilt and curse that wretched popping sound when I hear it.
On a related note, has anyone else gone to put dishes in the dishwasher and found it full of clean dishes and after putting away the clean dishes realized that they accidentally put the aforementioned dirty dishes away with the clean ones? I thought that happened the last time I emptied the dishwasher and I sort of shrugged and thought, “Should I go through the cupboard and find those two dirty plates, they only had bread on them…” but then I saw the dirty dishes sitting on top of the coffee maker. [That sound you heard a couple seconds ago was my mother gasping – I assure you, she raised me better.]
And completely unrelated to the above… I heard a new Kid Rock song today (see below) called “Care” and I was reminded that I inexplicably like Kid Rock’s music (not to be confused with actually liking Kid Rock as a person).
Posted in Confessions, Life in general
ememby 