Where to start?

This was quite an exciting week around here, not to mention somewhat busy. Monday night was graduation at the kids' old school, Marshall Academy in Holly Springs. We went to see old friends and had a great time catching up with folks over there (though most didn't recognize me!).
On the way over there we found out that Mom was coming to our house the next day for Pete's graduation. Oh, boy....as she talked, I just kept picturing my house in my head. Or more to the point, I kept picturing the MESS in my house! I knew there was no way to get it looking decent before she got here (Patrick and I had to work Tuesday, leaving the kids home alone to "clean". Since I never really taught them, I knew we were sunk!). But we were so blessed to have her here and really enjoyed the quick visit. She got here Tuesday evening around 5, we left for Pete's graduation at 6:30, then dinner, then home to bed. Mom was gone by 7:45 Wed. morning.
I was reffing the water-balloon volleyball game, standing a safe 5 feet from the jello pool, when I caught a flash out of the corner of my eye. Next thing I knew I was flying through the air in Eric's arms, right into the pool! I had no time to brace myself so there was very little damage done (Patrick's first question was whether I "popped" anything!). Thus my first foray into the jello-wrestling, and it's awesome! In fact, if it didn't need to be an outdoor sport, I'd bring all the stuff to my sister Leslie's house and we'd do it for a new Thanksgiving activity! OMG the kids would have a BLAST (so would the adults!).
At some point during the party my neighbor Eric decided it was time for Ryan to have a haircut. So he recruited one of the kids' friends to help, and they duct taped him TIGHT to minimize the fight. Then Eric carried him outside to a chair and duct taped him to that, also. Then he whipped out the clippers and began to shave Ryan's head! I gotta give it Ryan.....he took it like a man! :)
The week's over now and all we have to do is clean up from the party....still. I picked up tons of stuff tonight, but we still have 50 gallons of Jello to dispose of!! That stuff is STILL the same consistency it was Wednesday night, so I had to call to find out how to get rid of it. That's probably something I should've considered before I bought it, huh?
Oh yeah, also on the agenda this weekend (besides disposing of the Jello) is cleaning the hot tub. Funny (or NOT) how that jello just clings to EVERY inch of you, even fully clothed! Put 6 or 7 teens in a hot tub after they've been wrestling, and well...it ain't pretty! I think there's probably a brownie or 2 floating around in there, as well. I know it's brownie, because I witnessed the act myself. Christy threw the brownie to Pete, who dropped it in the hot tub. When he said, "Where'd it go?" someone else said, "There it is!" and everyone else yelled, That's not a brownie!!!" Teens are so much fun!

Congrats, Ryan!

Ryan turned 15 a couple weeks ago, which means he's "permit-able". Pete took him to get his permit the day after his birthday, only to find out that there's a special application that we, his parents, had to fill out and sign. So they picked up the application, brought it home for Patrick to fill out, and headed back to the DMV (nearest one is 20 miles away)with Mabry. Got to the DMV, where Ryan realized that he forgot the application his dad had just signed!
Earlier this week, Pete took Ryan back to the DMV with the application. Ryan got to the window, handed the papers over to the lady, who promptly wrote "VOID" on the application because it wasn't notarized!. Oh, boy, was Ryan ticked off!(To be fair, he had every reason to be ticked; on the bottom of the application is a place to get it notarized, and Patrick didn't think it needed to be done. That in itself was an argument between Patrick and I, but we won't go there right now! :) )
So, Friday being my birthday, I took off work, spent $70 getting my hair done, checked Ryan out of school, got his application notarized and took him to the DMV. You'd think having JUST had my hair done that I wouldn't want to get it messy, but it was such a pretty day we drove Mimi with the top down and my hair flying free. When we got to the DMV, I realized that MY license expired that day. What a pretty picture I made.....NOT!
Anyway, Ryan took his test, passed, and got his permit. He didn't get to drive home, though, because Mimi's a stick. Ryan barely has a clue about an automatic, so I wasn't even gonna attempt letting him drive Mimi! I let him drive me around yesterday in Sparky (our '94 F150), and I've got to admit I quite enjoyed having my sunglasses fly off my face twice. I'm sure eventually the boy will get the hang of those brakes!

Graduation Party: Take One

I should have known. Nothing much else was going right so far: I'd paid $33 for express shipping from Oriental Trading only to provide them with the WRONG address (correct home street address, but with my work city/state!)I discovered my mistake Friday evening and was told (praise God!) that the box was in Batesville and I could go pick it up. That was 6:30 Friday, Batesville's 20 minutes away, and the FedEx closes at 7pm. I was up to my elbows in hamburger meat (making patties for burgers), so I yelled to Pete to finish the burgers as I ran out the door. Crisis averted! Got all the buckets filled Friday night for his party on Saturday. We're SET!
Saturday morning we're awoken by loud thunderstorms and rain beating against the windows. No sweat, I thought; party's at 5 so surely it'll clear up. And it did....right up 'til 4 pm, AFTER we'd set evertyhing up for the party (luckily not the jello yet). Promptly at 4 the bottom fell out of the sky and thunder & lightening came quickly & fiercely. It rained for hours! No way could we have had to games we'd planned on, so we moved on to Plan B. Everyone still showed up, so we projected movies onto the wall. They ate hotdogs (thanks, Patrick, for grilling them in the rain!), chips, about a million canned drinks, and cake. The music was so loud, and there really was no room in here for adults. So we (7 adults) did the practical thing: we took all the alcohol next door to Angie's house and sat on her (covered) pack patio, leaving our house to the kids! :)
When we came back they were playing a game they made up that involved lots of leis and the ceiling fan!
Later this week we're going to do it all again. We've still got plenty of food & drinks, so we're just gonna pick a sunny day, call all our friends, and have another party!

Happy Birthday, Ryan!

For some reason we celebrated his birthday twice...I guess it's 'cause he's twice as special. Or as Mabry would say,he's 2-handed special! The night of his birthday, Patrick and I took Ryan to Windy City Grille. Since it was only the 3 of us (Mabry & Pete were otherwise occupied), it wasn't quite as lively. So we decided to try it again last night at Outback Steak House. YUMMMY!!!! We asked the balloon-lady to make him something special for his birthday, so she made him a lady-viking hat and sang happy birthday to him! LOL
How do these things go so fast?! The night before his birthday, I just kept remembering how short & fat he was when we brought him home from the hospital. At just under 9 pounds and only 18" long, he looked like a Butterball! I should've had my first clue he'd be tall when at his one week checkup he'd grown to 21"! Now the boy's 6'4" and looks like a string-bean!
He'll go to get his permit next week; he hasn't studied for it yet so didn't feel ready for it on his birthday. The boy had BETTER hurry up with it, though. In MS you can drive w/out an adult at 15 & 1/2, and by then all my other drivers will be out of the house. As it stands now, I'm gonna have to do my own grocery shoppping for 4 months!!! :O

The Bully, Bullied

Bully Cat, aka Chico, has been the neighborhood bully for years. He's well-known around the neighborhood, and depending on whether he's killed/maimed your cat, he's either well-loved or well-hated.
He's been an indoor-outdoor cat, very well-trained. Or shall I say, WE were very well-trained. All he had to do to be let out was to sit at the door and stare it down, and we'd automatically go open it for him. His life was really sweet!
Until last week, that is. His latest victim was the cat across the street. At 14 pounds, Chico could do some damage to a measely 8 pound cat, and he did....repeatedly. I finally got a call from the distraught owner, begging me to do something with our cat. (sigh) (Why do things like this ONLY happen when Patrick's out of town!?) So on Monday night at 9pm, after hanging up the phone, I went to Walmart to buy everything we'd need to turn this hulking bully into an indoor-only cat.
After much crying and squalling like a girl, clawing at the windows, and scratching at the door, the cat's finally calming down a bit. Until this morning. I awoke this morning to the sound of something knocking on a window. I came out to the living room to find Chico sitting in the sill, but HE wasn't doing the knocking. Sitting on my vegetable box outside, just a few feet away from the window, was a robin. This robin hops along the edge of the box, then flies to the window and flutters against it. Then he'll hop around on the outer window sill, jumping up and down in front of Chico, looking at him the whole time! Chico is going insane! He's jumping at the bird, banging his head against the window, clawing and striking out at....the glass. The bully is being bullied. Nature meets out its own justice!

Oh yeah!

This was done one night this past week; I slept through it, though I'm not sure how! The "singer" is Pete's friend (aka my 3rd son) CJ, with Pete doing the lights and Ryan filming.

Been a while, huh?

It's been 3 weeks since I started back to work; holy cow, I can't believe it! It's been fine. My co-workers did an amazing job while I was out and it didn't take me much time to get caught up, but I haven't stopped running since! This past week was Spring Break, but it sure didn't seem like it!
Monday was spent on the road, returning from our trip to Augusta. We sure enjoyed seeing Mom & Bob, and felt especially honored to have Laura & the girls drive up to see us! I coudln't believe it when I saw her pull up at 11:00 AM! That's IN THE MORNING still! I hated that we couldn't stay longer Saturday, but we had to see Granny. One of these days we won't be in such a rush to leave Atlanta! :)
Tuesday morning was spent at my plastic surgeons' office, and the rest of Tuesday was spent in bed. It seems the trip was a bit too much too soon, though I wouldn't have thought nearly 2 months was too soon! At any rate, the swelling was so bad from the trip that I had to be aspirated Tuesday morning. THAT was a shock! I thought I was doing fine, it was just a scheduled follow-up visit. But once he turned me around to look at my back side, he was NOT happy! I knew I was swollen more so than usual; Monday evening when I got into bed, my butt literally bunched up around my waist! I had to lift my butt up off the bed and push it back down to where it's supposed to be! Whe I explained it to the doc, he called it Ascending Ass Syndrome! LOL At any rate, Dr. Aldea was very unhappy, and so was I as soon as I saw that huge needle and 60cc syringe! He had to stick me twice and got 100 CCs out of my back! I had to stand for this procedure, and after that 2nd time sticking me, I could feel myself blacking out. I told him he'd better hurry up or he's gonna have to pick me up off the floor! He and Patrick got me to the table in time so we avoided a minor mishap. So now I'm back to wearing compression granny-panties to hold in a rolled up towel to apply pressure to my lower back; it's so hard to feel sexy when you're walking around with what looks like a hard-on in your lower back!
Wednesday and Thursday were spent at work. I love that I can work when I'm supposed to be off and claim that time later as comp time! That'll allow me to take time off in April to go to the beach! :)
Friday was spent in Starkville, MS. They call it Starkvegas, and I can see why; that place is happening! It's still a fairly small town, but it's a university town with TONS of restaurants, and it's all spread out so it seems like a huge town. At any rate, we were there for a tour of Mississippi STate University, where Mabry will be attending in the Fall. Her friend Joel gave us such a detailed tour, and I'm so thankful he offered to do that! We had a blast looking at different dumps...er...I mean apartments. Mabry MAY have decided to stay on campus, but I dare not say that for sure!
Patrick left Friday night for his 2 week drill. We met him in Winona, MS for dinner on our way home. He's spending 2 weeks in Massachusettes....in March. Usually it's in some hot Hell hole in the middle of July, so this is probably a nice change for them! Oh yeah, and for those that don't know, he made MAJOR!
Finally, today....last day of Spring Break (kinda), and I didn't do much other than eat, eat, and um....eat some more. I'm sure it's exhaustion that caused me to do that, and I should've just stayed my butt in bed, but stupid me didn't. UGH! Guess I"ll always fight this food addiction, but it will NOT win! I'll go to the gym tomorrow, or at LEAST make an effort to eat right!