Daddy Gone & Daddy's Birthday

We had a few things going on this week involving Duncan.  First off was that he was gone on a work trip to New Orleans starting Sunday evening and returned Wednesday afternoon.  He did not eat overly well while he was gone as much of the fare was such things as frog legs and rabbit stew.  Apparently foods like these are quite the norm in the Big Easy.  Needless to say, he was quite happy to return home to normal vegetarian food he said!  And then yesterday was his birthday, the big 3-5.  I'll get back to that.

Going back to last weekend, I don't recall anything in particular happening at church although we were happy to have Ron and Elaine with us again.  Unfortunately the sermon was titled "Giving" which was basically an appeal to the church members to pay their tithe and offerings.  I know these kinds of sermons are warranted from time to time but the timing of this one was poor.

Saturday night found us at the Isidros so we could catch up with Allen and Tangie and hear all about their cruise (without kids) from the weekend before and long for the day when we ourselves can go on another one.  I'm not sure if it will work out since I pretty much have eight weeks left until I'm ineligible for going on one (not allowed past 24 weeks of pregnancy).  Anyway, we were able to live vicariously through them and their tales of childless bliss.  This was their first time on Carnival and they got to engorge themselves with a nightly helping of chocolate melting cake which lived up to my rave reviews, thankfully.  As a goodwill gesture, Tangie even made some for us and I closed my eyes for a second and pictured myself enjoying it to the sounds of silence and the gentle rocking of the boat.  Ahhh, yes.  Heaven!

To die for!

Sunday morning we awoke and I swear we went back in time to exactly two weeks before when I woke up on that Sunday to go help Jennifer with her magazine staging photography project.  No, I didn't have to do that (Jennifer is actually in Italy with her mother, that lucky dog!) but the weather was a complete deja vu.  I know people up north make fun of us, I'm sure, but 30's down here is cold.  We even broke the record two weeks ago when it was only 30 at the airport.  This Sunday was a cold and windy day like the one two weeks ago.  Nevertheless, we bundled up and headed down to Winter Garden Village where we pulled the trigger on a dining room table from Haverty's, finally.  A little later when we were back at home, Duncan muttered to me that he didn't remember that the table was 96 inches and I responded that neither did I and I wasn't happy about it!  We had been looking at this table for months and I thought I had recalled that it was the right size but my memory apparently wasn't good.  The table we have now in the kitchen expands to 103 inches and I was positive I didn't want one for my dining room that was smaller than that.  I decided to call them to cancel the order which was a major bummer considering how long it took us to make the decision (the main drawback is that it's a light wood and everything in our house is dark brown/black but we loved the table and figured we could have it stained if it looked awful).  But then, it was like a miracle.  As I talked to our salesperson (I feel like she's our own personal sales rep as this is the third major purchase we've made from them) she said "Oh, you know, I noticed that we have a new table in the back that we are about to put out. It's a dark color and has distressed wood like I know you like and it has two leaves that extend the table to 121 inches."  Jackpot!  I had Duncan take the girls down right away to check it out and honestly, it is perfect.  It was exactly what we wanted.  It got delivered on Wednesday and I couldn't be happier.  So it all ended up well.

Trying out the new chairs as the table gets delivered.  I call this the "Brady face."

The new table without the leaves.  The tape on the wall is our plan for a piece of art but now the hard part is picking something out!

Monday was another chilly day and we stayed inside for most of it although we did take a nice walk in the late afternoon to the playground on the hill.  We ran into some neighbors who had two boys and a girl around the kids age and they had a good time playing with them.

Tuesday the deja vu continued and we ended up heading to Chapin Station to play in the sand.  It had warmed up to the upper 60's/low 70's and it was a gorgeous day.  Allen met us there with the kids and since Braelyn was on spring break this last week, she was part of the crew which made Calleigh's day.  Every time the kids see each other, they act like it's been months since they've all seen each other.  The yelling and screaming in delight is quite something.

The girls insisted on a picnic in the backyard after we got back from the park.

Wednesday morning we didn't make it to story time since we were waiting on the table to be delivered.  Afterwards we did go to the library to get a new round of books.  It was pretty empty of kids since story time was over and the girls were excited to get a computer to themselves to try out the games.  This did not go over well with Brady who, of course, wanted to be on it himself.  He made his displeasure known and I had to quickly herd the crew out.  If he's not making a fuss about using the computer, then he's busy pulling all the books out...there is literally nothing else to do there like puzzles, coloring, etc.  This has irritated me to no end because at our old library we had all kinds of things to occupy small toddlers and we could hang out at the library for a good amount of time.  Here, yeah right.  I finally decided to ask about it at the front desk. They responded, "Yeah, we used to have stuff like that but the kids would write on the floors and throw things so we decided not to replace any of it when it wore out."  To which I said, "Hmm, I guess the kids must be much better behaved in Casselberry because I never noticed anything like that happening there and we had all that stuff."  At any rate, it's just sad because we do enjoy the library but it clearly does not work as a place for us to be for any bit of time other than when it's story time.  And yes, I've tried distracting Brady with looking through books with him but he wants nothing to do with that when his sisters are doing other, more exciting things.

Duncan arrived home late Wednesday afternoon much to our delight.  He brought back a bunch of little goodies that he got at the conference he attended.  We went down to Winter Garden Village to look for a centerpiece for our new table and anything else of interest.  To celebrate his return, we treated ourselves to dinner out at Mimi's Cafe (yes, the irony was not lost on us that it's a New Orleans themed restaurant) since we had a coupon (of course!).

At Mimi's.

Thursday we made a round of errands including Jo-Ann's, Kohls, and Costco.  We were looking for the letter to spell PLAY in the play room and the Jo-Ann's near us did not have the "Y."  I was thinking we should just get the other three letters so we would have those but we didn't for whatever reason.  Now, at the other Jo-Ann's, they were missing the "A".  This time I got the other three letters.  As we paid for our purchase, the cashier asked, "Did you find everything you were looking for?"  I looked down pointedly at the P, L, and Y and was like, "Yes, we are putting these letters up over our (ply) wood pile."

Friday morning was yard sale day and I found myself traipsing back to part of our old neck of the woods in Maitland.  For some reason, the yard sales in Apopka just haven't picked up since Christmas.  I don't know why.  We went to quite a few sales but didn't find a whole lot except a few clothes for me which isn't even that exciting because soon I won't be able to wear them any more.  But speaking of yard sales, we are quite excited that we will be having our own yard sale in a couple of weeks!  Our community is having a yard sale on Saturday and Sunday (23rd & 24th) and so we'll do a sale on the Sunday, obviously.  We don't have a ton to sell since we tried to get rid of most "surplus" when we moved but we do have some.  My main reason for having one is that Calleigh has always talked about having one so that she can sell lemonade and cookies.  We've already been through their toys once to see if there is anything they call sell and they have come up with a few things.  It will be interesting to see how it goes if someone decides to buy something of theirs.  But so far, Calleigh is excited to sell some of the toys.  Why?  "Let's sell some toys so we can get money to buy more toys!"

Friday was Duncan's birthday and Ron and Elaine came over mid-afternoon for festivities later in the evening.  We all went down to Winter Garden Village to get the missing "A" at Jo-Ann's and the paint for them.  We're also working on a felt board and chalk board to put up in the play room.  When we got back, the Isidros and Tangie's mom, Jane, who is in town from Denver, came over for make-your-own pizzas and salad.  The girls helped in decorating the cake and they had a good time.  I shouldn't just say the girls any more because Brady has to be involved in everything now too.  In fact, pretty much every time I'm in the kitchen doing something he'll come up to me and say "I help you.  I help you." which means that he wants me to lift him on the counter so he can "help."

Licking the beaters full of frosting.

Our new and new improved smoke alarm went off while we were making pizzas but with good reason.  There was a LOT of smoke.  Here the birthday boy waves the broom to try and turn it off.

"Stop this insanity!"

Last night after everyone cleared out and I got the girls to bed, it was almost 9:30.  Usually I go down for my evening nap around 8:30.  I knew falling asleep at around 9:45 was going to be bad news if I wanted to write this blog last night.  Sure enough, I woke up at around 11:00 and finally dragged myself out of bed to finish cleaning the kitchen.  And that was it.

Church was as usual today.  This afternoon, as I write this in fact, Blake and Evan are over.  Jennifer doesn't come back until tomorrow and Bruce's mom who is watching them had to leave this afternoon before Bruce was going to be home so they came over here for a few hours.  They all get along so well and it's funny just listening to them sit on the patio and talk (not that it's all they've been doing but I think Duncan scared them about making a mess upstairs so they're avoiding it!)  As I listen know, Blake is regaling them with a story about someone taking a shower, falling down, and breaking his neck and had to go to the hospital naked.  The girls are enthralled (and if they don't want to take a shower next Sabbath with me, I'm holding Blake responsible).  The story is wrapping up with Blake saying the guy was in the hospital for 25 days.  I have no idea if this is a true story but it's entertaining.

Calleigh tried to get Blake to put his arm around her but he would have none of it!

Have a good rest of the weekend.

I vacuumed the van last Sunday while Duncan was at Haverty's.  It was so cold I made Brady put on his hat...which didn't last long.  Oh, and it's well worth paying someone to vacuum for you.

Aubree's drawing that she had me text to Daddy while he was in New Orleans.

Aubree fell asleep watching the hockey game on Tuesday night and I texted the picture to Duncan to which he responded, "That's what happens to me too when I watch hockey."

New curtains, book shelf/bench, light in playroom.  Eventually there will be a table under this light.