Monday, February 21, 2011

Trip to Illinois

This weekend we went on a trip down to Illinois. Normally I let the kids know when we're leaving but since they bounce off the walls all day long until we go, I left it a mystery. They knew we were headed down there, but did not know which day. It was fun to listen to Matthew try to reason it out and figure out when we were leaving. Anna didn't need to think about it: she just put on her coat and shoes and waited :) Of course, she was three hours ahead of schedule, but she didn't care.

We took off on Thursday after Rob returned home and it was such a nice, peaceful day at home before we left. The kids eagerly awaited Rob's arrival to find out the departure time and we kept to our regular daily schedule to help pass the time. We took off and arrived at his parents' home in Normal around 7pm. We messed with them a little bit and took a slightly different route, pretending we were lost the entire time until we pulled into the driveway. I love being an ornery parent!

We had a wonderful visit with Rob's folks from Thursday night through Saturday noon. We also snuck in a visit with my sister and her two little ones Friday morning. My niece and nephew are so adorable!! The kids ripped around together for over an hour, then we headed back for lunch and a nice, long visit with Rob's grandpa. I, unfortunately, got a headache that afternoon and had to nap. I still can't figure out why, but at least the nap helped. We had dinner at Avanti's that evening with family in the area, then visited with Rob's brother and his family afterwards. Matthew and Ben had a grand time ripping around the house with their cousin Jamie while Anna was far more fascinated with baby cousin Julian, who just learned to walk. I still think one of these days I'm going to sneak that little guy into my suitcase and bring him home :)

The next day the kids and Rob went out to Rob's grandmother's farm with his dad to see the two windmills that had been placed out there. I really think that was the highlight of their whole trip! The boys have not stopped talking about how big those windmills were. They got right up next to them and were very impressed. Even Anna has talked about it quite a bit. They were also excited to see where Grandpa Litwiller had lived when he was a boy. I really do think my children are farm kids at heart.

After lunch we left in our usual flurry and went to Pontiac. My mom was watching my brother's four children and so we got to see four more cousins. We hadn't seen them since the summer so it was fun to see how much they've grown. They left shortly after we arrived and Rob took the kids upstairs so we could prepare for Mom's Stampin Up! workshop. She had three ladies in attendance and all three of them took advantage of Sale-a-bration so Mom had a pretty nice workshop. We had a good time visiting in the evening.

We attended church the next day and all three kids went merrily off to their respective classrooms with no problems. They love the classes at Pontiac Bible Church. We enjoyed a great sermon and then went home to some yummy meatloaf. My mom has the bestest meatloaf recipe ever! We left shortly after lunch because the weather in Wisconsin didn't look so good for that day. We did him some ice about 20 miles or so from home, but made it right before another ice storm hit. The hardest driving we had was just getting down our street, but I'm glad we got in before the plows went through or we would never have made it into the driveway.

The kids had a pajama day today and are very tired (and in bed early tonight!) All in all it was a wonderful trip!

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Bye-Bye Birdie

Tomorrow night we will bid a fond farewell to our new feathered friend. Four Lits have shown signs of an allergy and so we have to get rid of Sky. Ben is the hardest hit. He has never shown an allergy to an animal before, but for the past week and a half he has had a stuffy nose, bad cough at times, and purple rings around his eyes. I thought perhaps he was exhausted, so we've tried putting him to bed early, but nothing was working. I finally took him to the doctor yesterday and he said it looked like an allergy. I did a little figuring and when I realized his symptoms began a few days after getting the bird that he is indeed allergic. Anna, who is allergic to dogs and cats, has had more sneezing than usual but nothing awful. I have had light allergy symptoms each day but nothing unbearable. Rob, too, has had dry itchy eyes.

Matthew will be absolutely devastated when the bird goes home. He loves Sky and has done so well helping to take care of him. He is very ready for a pet, but we'll just have to do more research and find something we can all agree on and that does not bother our allergies. Makes me want to cry just thinking about him, because I know how terribly upset he will be.

He did tell me today that he thought Ben should go instead. I told him we could make Ben act like a bird but Ben didn't think that was a good idea.

Friday, February 11, 2011

New Blog

I started a blog just for my stamping business and after two posts on the stamp website, I decided to move it to the same blog family as the family blog. It's easier for me to manage and I don't have to learn anything new :) It's called "Simply Encouragink" and the focus in on using paper crafting to encourage others. There is a link to my blog on the side. Enjoy!

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Jail Break

Yesterday, my worst fear came true as a bird owner. The bird got out when Rob was NOT here to catch him. I love birds, but I do not handle them and the kids have done so well with him and with not touching the cage. But accidents do and will happen!

I was finalizing some business with the Schwan man at the front door when Matthew jumped up and moved quickly past the bird cage, causing it to tip over on it's side. Bird seed and droppings flew all over the carpet and floor near the cage and the bird was flapping around like crazy. I went over to set the cage upright when the bird found an opening and flew out. The poor Schwan man was a little startled and looked like he wanted to escape as well. I was kind of hoping he was an expert bird catcher, but apparently he just wanted out :) He quickly went out the front door and I closed the big door behind him, keeping the bird contained in the living room.

The next 30 minutes really should have been on video. I wasn't planning to touch him, but I thought I might be able to coax him back into his cage by placing it on the floor with the door wide open. He was much more interested in the seed all over the ground and began to eat. Any time we got near him he would fly toward the front door. Thankfully, he pretty well kept to the living room with only one jaunt into the study. Ben shooed him out pretty quickly. I have to keep him away from my stamp stuff as 1) he eats paper and 2) my upline/boss is allergic to parakeets and any work I do for her must be kept parakeet-free.

Then I got the bright idea to have Ben try to pick him up. Ben is the bravest of my children and eagerly agreed to help out. I told him to pick up the bird as if he were trying to pick up a bubble without popping it. I certainly didn't want a squished parakeet on my hands...or between Ben's. Ben corned the bird, who was sitting on top of his cage, and actually did pick him up. Sky pecked at Ben, which caused Ben to drop him. Ben then put on his mittens and tried again...for a long time! It was pretty obvious that the bird was NOT going to let himself get caught again!

We finally tried to herd him into the cage instead. Ben pretended to try to catch him, which caused Sky to hop around the sides of his cage. Between the two of us, we got him to hop onto the inside of his door, which I quickly shut. I had already righted everything in the cage and gotten him fresh seed, so he was good to go. We put him back on his table and then proceeded to vacuum the mess from the fall.

Oh, where were Anna and Matthew at this time? Hiding together on the stairs watching the action. Anna was petrified of the bird being out, although she was very excited to tell Daddy all about it when he came home. Matthew tried once to catch the bird, but that was the extent of his help. So my Ben saved the day :)

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Mousehunt continued

Yesterday I was walking through the dining room when I saw a bit of bagel by the closet door. I hadn't noticed that yesterday, so I bent down to get a closer look. Mouse droppings everywhere. Looks like our friend had a friend. He must have tried to get that bagel back through the closet door. Rob caught him this morning and is planning to empty out the closet tomorrow to look for the beast's lair. Bleh. I think I'll hide in the study and stamp.

Monday, February 7, 2011

Mousehunt 2011

Just we thought we had taken care of the mouse problem, they came back!! Last spring, Rob dealt with a mouse problem of smallish-epidemic proportions but we weren't prepared for SMART mice. Yeah...ever seen Mousehunt? We had one of those...minus the clever mouse who made string cheese.

Last Monday or Tuesday, Rob was in the bathroom and watched a little mouse drop down from under the sink cabinet. It saw Rob and scurried back up the hole. Rob set a trap and left for work, leaving me a note describing the situation. Yes, folks, he broke the rules. Rule #14: Don't leave for work until you have caught any rodents you see roaming around my house!!

We avoided using that bathroom all day until Rob came home and pulled out everything to find the entryway. Turns out, the mouse came from UNDER the cabinet (but Rob did clean out under the sink for me!) so there wasn't much to be done. Of course, there was something to be done about the mouse droppings I found in my pan cabinet when I was making lunch! EEEWWW!!! And I found them AFTER I had made lunch!! Rob plugged up yet another hole and we waited to see if we could find the intruder.

Friday night, Rob and I were enjoying a movie when I saw something small and furry next to the closet in the dining room. Yup, the mouse. He ran under the piano...right past the mousetrap! The trap is a live one that can catch up to four mice and I guess he wasn't hungry for peanut butter. We watched him make his way around the piano bench and head for the dining room. At that point, we moved and made noise so he would go back into the closet. We played this game a few times before bed. Rob set the trap closer to the closet, but he still wasn't caught by morning.

Saturday Rob pulled out the big guns and got a snap trap. He smeared peanut butter everywhere...and on Sunday morning found the peanut butter gone, trap unsnapped. Anna picked it up, Rob grabbed it from her and snapped his thumb, so at least he caught something :) He set it again Sunday night and this morning I woke up to a note that read, "Got him!" And Rob also took out the trash, so bonus!!

And in the meantime, we found evidence that the mouse had scampered through the silverware drawer, measuring cup drawer, and utensil drawer, all of which have been cleaned out and scrubbed. Bleh. My mom gave us the idea of using steel wool to plug up the holes, so Rob will spend some time this week re-cleaning out the closet and finding the entryways.

Here's to hoping for no more furry friends this winter!

Saturday, February 5, 2011

Busy, Busy Week!

We had a rather interesting and busy week this past....week. Hmm...running low on words, I guess! Rob's department had Monday off to let the other departments catch up, so we decided to go to the Milwaukee Public Museum. We wanted to get there early because the storm was expected to hit us sometime in the afternoon. We left around 8:30, got about 10 miles down the road, and turned around for home. Apparently, it decided to start a early. The kids were a little disappointed, but handled the change of plans well. We went to Walmart instead and got a few things for Sky the English parakeet. I'm so glad we were there early because apparently the people of Watertown completely panicked about the coming blizzard and swarmed the store later in the day. I found that to be rather silly considering that our town is quick to clean off the streets, but I guess if it made everyone feel better....

I decided not to play "mean teacher-mommy" and let the kids have the day off school, even though our field trip plans were cancelled. And I wasn't feeling well. I decided to skip Bible study on Tuesday morning as I didn't want to drive in the snow. We had a nice, restful day...and then the blizzard hit. The Custom Shoppe shut down on Wednesday and Rob was able to stay home and spend much of the day shoveling. We don't have a snowblower...and don't really need one with what little we have to shovel. Didn't look like the people WITH snowblowers were able to use them anyway! Our neighbor gave up partway through and just took out a good, old shovel. Ben went over to "help" him out with his little shovel. We were able to get to church that night since the storm was basically over by mid-morning. We have a great snow plow crew here in town and everything was cleaned off by afternoon.

Thursday was another busy day as we had two activities to attend. And of course, two of the kids were up before Rob left, so I knew I'd be dragging cranky people around all day. We attended Mom's group in the morning (and I put the cranky people in the nursery!). There were more moms than usual in attendance with two new people. I picked up the kids from the nursery and treated them to Happy Meals at McDonald's. Then we were off to the Johnson Creek library for a Valentine craft day. Anna and Matthew were in their element for sure! Both of them love making crafts. I didn't really have to help Matthew at all and Anna only needed a little guidance here and there. She's doing so well! Ben only made two or three crafts, then just sat there. The early morning rising had caught up with him and he was exhausted. I didn't think he would even make it to the car!

There were two reporters at the craft day taking loads of pictures of the kids. The photographer from the Watertown paper kept taking tons of pictures of Anna. She was on the front page of the paper, along with two other children, and so cute! Her picture was also on the website that day. Matthew may or may not have been in the other paper, but we are not sure yet. So exciting!

Friday was a more low-key day for us and we ended it with a fun family Wii night. We're trying out Disney's Epic Mickey. The boys and Rob really love it! Once my headache goes away, I'll try it out as well.

And I'm looking forward to some fun stamp events next week, along with a quieter schedule!