Friday, October 28, 2011

New Projects are Coming! New Projects are Coming!

This year we let our annual Halloween bash go in lieu of finishing some things and trying to start and finish some things before Christmas. Truthfully, the goal is to finish them before December 10, 2011. It will be a challenge. There is a lot LOT lot to do. There will be pictures and lots of them.

We are also planning a good ole' fashioned Christmas shin-dig this year. The very 1940-50's Bing Crosby crooning in the background kind of party. One you can bring your kids to and your parents to and you can still have a grown-up drink in the "grown-up" section or you can have the abundance of other refreshments that will be scattered about, kind of Christmas. On the 10th of December (which will also be a celebration of my Mom whose birthday it is).

So, there is a lot to do between now and then - more than you can imagine. Nevertheless, it should be interesting to watch.

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Happy Birthday to Me! Happy Birthday to Me!

Happy Birthday!
Happy Birthday!
Happy Birthday to me!

It is 5:34 p.m. on October 26, 2011. It is a quiet Wednesday evening. My hubby is working as usual and my kiddos have gone to Nana's for Wednesday dinner and church...and I am debating on what to do for myself for my birthday. A little internet Christmas shopping for the kids, dinner and movie by myself, or what I will probably do (what I do every single Wednesday evening) is homework.

Homework pays you back. Homework is the one thing that you can give 100% of yourself to, and you WILL see results. You can love it and double check it and consentrate great amounts of time on it and it will reward you with things like A's and B's and Dean's List honors and 3.75+ averages...children...not so much. I have loved my children tirelessly over the past several... how do you say all of their LIVES??? But they very rarely, if ever, remember my birthday. It's ok. I don't expect them too. They are kids, with lives and girlfriends/boyfriends, plans, homework, track meets, work out schedules, in other words... "important kid stuff" to do.

Still sometimes, it's nice to be remembered a little by the ones you gave birth to.

Monday, October 24, 2011

Forty - Three.... Scaaaaaary!

So, day after tomorrow, Wednesday the 26th, I'll be 43 years old. Funny thing, by this time of the month my Mom has already asked me like 15 times what I want to do for my birthday. I haven't heard a peep out of anybody. Except the hubs. I know he remembers.

When you fall off the face of the earth (or facebook)... no one ever remembers LOL, but truthfully, I am not even worried... I think if no one remembers then technically we should get to go without that year. So, like truthfully, I should be 42 already and one more - well, that would put me back to 41... so I'll take that.

Here is to the world being busy and not really being a part of it. LOL! Yeah me! Oh, so, last week, I aced my statistics test, aced (more than aced) my Music App. mid-term, and aced a geology quiz and lab... so the time for work has been well used. Now, I'm off to study for the mid-term in Geology - which I am hoping goes swimmingly well.

Cheers!

Friday, October 14, 2011

I could use the help of course!

Help me win a $5,000 college scholarship. Vote for my essay!

So... it turns out...

Turns out that even though I know how to do some stuff and have spent well over, goodness let's not even TALK about money here, let's just say LOTS of money at Lowe's over the past five years... turns out - they aren't interested in hiring true do-it-yourself'ers. No seriously.

Yes, I am aware that I have almost 20 years of managerial experience. Yes, I am aware that I am only looking for a part-time no responsibility job and yes, I totally get that I'm 42 years old and should be doing something different with my life.

Here's what ya don't get. I AM doing something different with my life. I am going to school. FULL TIME. Before I worked full time and went to school part time. Didn't work. Now, it is working. I'm sorry that you can't see the benefit of hiring someone that knows how to match paint with your drapes, and lay tile, lay floors, put in lights, and assist in every other project you can come up with cause I ain't skeered a nothin'. But my goodness, you don't see that I show up to work on time (or early) pull my weight (and other's too) and that I've been known to bust a few chops in my time but have always thought it best to lead by example... i.e. work your @$$ off... but what you see, is a 42 year old woman, that is over qualified.

Thanks.

By the way... I either did the work or helped do the work on this too...

A once very dark eat in kitchen/den (with - count 'em - two light fixtures)and believe me, it wasn't just dark in there, it seemed dark EVERYWHERE. The kitchen window was blocked by the previous back porch, there was a dark rust colored indoor/outdoor carpet throughout the space... it was gloomy.
With some (albeit is classy) 1970's appliances... did I fail to mention the CARPET throughout... and it was massively full with the big 'ole kitchen table to feed my big 'ole family! If you set the table you had to move everything off the table so you could use it as work space...
Little or no counter space, there was a bar that separated the back door from the kitchen, but it was useless. So... we changed it. Recycled, repurposed, and reused every single thing we possibly could.

Into something like this (and in this picture the five recessed lights are not on... for the hallowed Christmas effect)...
The kids (all of them) had no problems roaming around the kitchen and dining area to get at all the snacks and food and drinks. There was space to prepare it and loads of space to set things out to offer it. With over 20+ folks in the house, for once, I didn't feel crowded at all.

And we did this. Me or the hubs or me AND the hubs... but WE did this. There is no more carpet. There is lots of light. There is a WINDOW in the kitchen that you can look out now. There is a chandelier (that might look familiar if you look at my previous living room post) in the dining area. The old bar that separated the kitchen from the den before was repurposed into a duel level island. There are now three bar stools there also, which the kids and I love to use. After all, the kitchen is still the heart of the home (at least at ours).

So, Dear Lowe's, you may not think I am a good fit to help the folks in your store... but to my friends, family and children... I am fearless and can do/will do/obviously have done LOTS of home improvement projects... and I'm not done.

Just wait until I get my degree in Environmental/Electrical Engineering... I will be unstoppable.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Off to work she goes...

So, I quit Facebook again - a couple of weeks ago. I am invisible to the world once again. It's ok. The only six people I really talk to in the whole wide world, still email, text or call, and I am good with that. I was struggling to stay on top of my school work. Seriously - struggling.

I dropped Facebook like a hot rock and kazaham, things start rolling along. I am not caught up yet, but if I stay off Facebook, I will most certainly attain the sacred Dean's List. I want it. So bad, I can taste it.

I am also looking for a j.o.b. A part-time one, so that I may afford to purchase Christmas presents for all five of my very undeserving children (ha ha). For what would Christmas be without presents under the tree??? However, I wonder if I will get everything done? Last year, I was working for the greatest boss in the world. Seriously - Gosh, I miss her. I knew when clients started falling off and closing their doors that I would lose my little part time job but it made me feel good about myself and secure in myself. You would think a 42 year old lady with plenty of work experience behind her that has plunged head first back in to college and made the grades would be fearless, but I'm not.

I've done loads of home improvement jobs myself (with the hubs), and I am smart (just ask me), but man, finding part-time jobs is like pulling teeth. They want you - part time - they do. But they don't want to deal with your stinking school schedule and goodness forbid you have children (much less five of them) which may require you to juggle your schedule every now and then. But I have both those things, plus tests that need to be taken and a house that must be cleaned (daily) and laundry that must be done (daily) and Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, July 4th and St. Patrick's Day decorations that must be put out and then rounded back up and put away. Who will do that while I am working the "here I am at your mercy part-time job at Lowe's that requires you to be available at the drop of a hat" job? Just wondering...

I have done a few things myself or with my hubby... see.

I have taken a room that I didn't hate, but wasn't proud of...












and worked and worked and worked on it... and made the children work and work and work on it with me...

and made it something that feels like home... and I am proud of it. It might not look like much, but moving a gas line, building "built-ins", mounting a flat screen and giving desk space for homework... those aren't magical things that just happen... add laying floors and painting, and putting trim where trim did not exist before... well then you've got something.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

So school....

Some days I am overwhelmed, but this week I am feeling pretty good. Last blog's discussion of the "not my best" English paper ever... wasn't so bad (An A - yeah). She appears to be a more of a "are you getting it?" teacher. As in, are you getting what you are reading? Apparently, I am.

Last assignment - I earned a perfect A. Therefore, I am sharing it with you. The thought was to read a 19th century poem by a puritan woman and understand her pain and put yourself there. Your home has burned to the ground... so what has become of you...?

Here is mine... you may not enjoy it, but my Professor did and that is enough for me.

“Not the Keepsake or the Space”
by Sharra Blair-Kucera

The skeletal remains of a Gibson guitar stand
A clay impression of one’s tiny hand
Parts of the music and the muse
Floodgates opened the heart abused

Fragments of pictures and memories
Births, celebrations, and family histories
Tormented and tattered, now ashes sake
Begging tomorrow from a dream to wake

Wet remains of papers lay scattered about
A lifetime devoted to a home throughout
Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter Egg Hunts and Halloween
Now nothing left, but recollections of these

Pap’s violin, Big Daddy’s guitar
Mamaw’s landscapes and Granmudi’s jars
Papa’s oldest cowboy hat
Momma’s china and all of that

Grandma’s picture of three states from her front porch
All in flames and what is left - scorched
No more laughter to be had at our table of seven
Granmudi bought it when my Mom was only eleven

Years have been spent around that table for many
Now charred wood and ash – before a chair for any
Water drips off the edges of a family’s dream
Like tears of the heart they glisten and glean

No more birthday parties or bar-b-q’s
No more “honey, I’m home” or “Darlin, what’s new?”
The old door you could hear slam down the block
No more does it stand – nothing to lock


The jewelry box that a ring came in
Gone quickly but the ring remains on his hand
So much lost that cannot be recovered
Momma’s old quilts will never again cover

Nevertheless, there are small things here and there
A picture blown free from the blackened despair
A ring in the ashes, a plate in the soot
Bits and pieces of a past – our only loot

We walked out of the ash, the soot, and the black
To realize what we have - built from our past
Strength, honor, and love - none could compare
From the ashes we rise up and the better we fair

Hold your loved ones dearly
Not the objects – those replace
In the end, the lives are precious
Not the keepsakes or the space