I need a SHOT of something!

What a morning! First of all... my sons were kind enough to get me up by 0500 this morning. I took Corbin to school at 0945 and had to pull him out of school at 1045! Here's the story and background....

As a former military family, we had beautiful military shot records. Unfortunately, our civilian pediatrician did not like how they were written so he transferred them to his own vaccination form. Well... he missed one!

Friday I turned in the enrollment paperwork for him to start school on Monday. The registrar was not there and apparently no one else knows how to check to make sure I turned in the required paperwork. She called today and informed me the shot records, social security card and birth certificate were missing. So I took what I had (the civilian doctor's shot record) up to the office. The school nurse made me drag Corbin out of class because he was missing a shot.

HMMM...

Needless to say I am not in a good mood today. Did I mention Cavan was at foot screaming?!

I tried to get the Pediatricians Office to fax a corrected copy to the school. It took 3 calls to the doctor's office to get a nurse to talk to me and then she wouldn't fax the records to the school. Thanks HIPPA!

So now when Cavan gets up from his nap, I have to drag both boys back to the school and try to get it all fixed! I'm NOT looking forward to that trip. I would be happy if I never had to step foot in that school again. I will be looking for a new pediatrician... one that is closer!

And, yes, I have a temper! So no lectures welcomed! I'm just venting!

A New School

Today was Corbin's first day at his new school. He did great according to his teacher. He would really like to ride the school bus, so I'm going to try to make arrangements this week for that. He goes mid-morning to early afternoon... different from his old school, but it worked out nicely.
Cavan laid down for a nap when we got home and slept just over 3 hours... I had to get him up to eat before picking up Corbin. I was able to get a little work done. Still trying to get reorganized and figure out what needs to be done. Trying to make my lists and prioritize.
Carl is in Florida this week at the Kennedy Space Center and staying on Coco Beach. Must be nice! I'm staying home with my screaming, unruly children. Yeah! We are hoping I'll be able to go with him eventually on a trip. WITHOUT the kids!
Carl has a pretty good job. His boss told Carl to take me somewhere nice to eat and they would pay for it. How many employers do that?! Now we just have to find a babysitter. It seems that almost every time we schedule one, someone ends up sick and we have to cancel... frustrating!
Oh well...
I better get going. Dishes are waiting!

We now have a home.

We are finally in our first home. In, but not settled by any means! It's very overwhelming all around. Sometimes hard to get motivated to do what needs to be done. We really got lucky today. The house really needed new blinds. Either the blinds were broken, barely worked, or missing all together. I happened to check the Big Lots flyer.... blinds on sale. 2"faux blinds. They only had a size close to 3 of our windows... Carl is going to have to trim an inch or two, but worth the hassle for the price. Then JCPenney's has 2" faux blinds on sale, so I went a picked up several. Then one of my new favorites... overstock.com ..... had bamboo roman shades cheap for my dining room windows! YEAH.... privacy!

Carl is working on getting my office doors fixed... needed locks to keep the boys out.
Still have lots of unpacking, sorting, organizing, etc.
Some painting left to do. Dining Room, Master Bath, Guest Room, and Entry/Hall areas.
We really need some new flooring (in the kitchen especially). Need a new window in the play room. Need a few doors.

Neverending it seems.

well... i guess i better get to work! or maybe just to bed!!!!

Aunt Gin... Hero of the Day!

We started painting the dining room on Wednesday. Caramelized Orange. It was awful, the paint was splotchy... horrible! So we gave it a night and then yesterday we attempted it again, thinking a second coat would take care of it... no such luck.
My wonderful Aunt Gin wallpapers and paints professionally so we gave her a call. It all came down to a paint roller. She recommended the kind where the handle is in the middle. The pressure on the roller is distributed more evenly and your wrist and arm doesn't hurt as much. We painted the office and kitchen with one coat! So tomorrow we will try to tackle the dining room again to see if the new roller will get an even coat otherwise I will be learning to wallpaper.

THANKS Aunt Gin!!!

Family to the Rescue

You do not even want to see the list of things to do today. I don't even want to see the list.
But today... help is on the way! My wonderful parents are coming today through Sunday to help us get done and ready to move into the new house.
We WILL finish cleaning and prepping the house for painting today. We WILL finish all the repairs today that have to be done prior to painting. We WILL start painting tomorrow.

Wish us luck!

Today's accomplishments...

Well... we didn't quite get everything done we hoped, but we didn't start until two days later than originally planned. There's too much to do to catch up, so hopefully we will get all the initial stuff done tomorrow so we can start painting on Thursday. Having the boys around does not help either. Mom and Dad are coming tomorrow to help, so we will rotate babysitting shifts.
The fire ants are almost dead. The 2 ceiling fans were installed. The toilet fixed. The shower is more of a job than originally thought... it should get done tomorrow. Carl is still at the house working on patching holes. It's quite a job, especially when you want it done right. The previous owner must have had quite the temper. They tried to patch some holes, but did a horrible job. So we have to patch and re-patch holes.
So much cleaning... it's not just spray and wipe... it's scrubbing! Obviously they didn't care about the condition they lived in. Some of it is pretty disgusting. There's not just a little bit of dust... it's caked on dust. YUCK! I have to get on hands and knees to scrub the base boards... our backs are hurting.

just another day.

Today's work schedule....YIKES

A new day and more work to do. We had to split up shifts because of Corbin's school schedule, so Carl went to work on the house already this morning and I'll go this afternoon with the boys. Here is a "short" list of things to do today:

1. Kill Fire Ants.
2. Fix a toilet.
3. Fix a shower.
4. Repair the playscape (exposed nails)
5. Patch holes in walls/ceilings.
6. Install 2 ceiling fans.
7. Remove all face plates, etc to prep for painting.
8. CLEAN, CLEAN, CLEAN (that should take up 4 or 5 lines of the list)

I'm sure there's more, but I'm already brain dead at this point.
I guess we'll see how it goes.

We know once we get through the initial stuff, the house will be much improved and it will be worth the hard work. At least it's a house we can stay in long term. It has room to grow.

This next year I need to replace all the linoleum and some carpeted areas with tile. I will also look into new window treatments. We will be doing lots of landscaping and plant a garden.

Eventually we will install new carpet upstairs and put laminate floors downstairs. We also want to cover the deck. The kitchen will need new counter tops eventually. We would like to make the master bathroom a little bigger and replace the tub with a large shower. I would like to replace the patio sliding door with french doors. Lots to do... eventually.

Anyways... guess I better go supervise Cavan... he's a handful himself!

STOP Bobo!

A quick background for those of you not familiar with Diego. In the cartoon series, the Bobo brothers are two monkeys that are always causing trouble. So Diego tells the kids to say "stop bobo!" several times.
So..... Carl really likes to pester the kids. Cavan was eating lunch today and, of course, Carl had to find some way to pester a captive Cavan. Cavan then proceeded to tell Carl, "STOP BOBO!" Holding his hand out for the stop sign. It was really cute and unexpected, so we've been telling Carl today, "Stop, bobo!"

what did we get ourselves into?

we started working on the new house today. overwhelming.... where to start?! we had electricity, but no water until tomorrow. we installed one ceiling fan, need to install 2 more. removed cabinet doors... discovered hidden trash. fighting the fire ants... there is a huge colony under the wood deck, so carl ripped up a few boards and poured poison on their mound. it will take a good week to get them all. will have to pull up more of the deck.
met a neighbor and her son... she lives a few houses down.
cavan fell down the stairs...no injury thank goodness. not sure he learned his lesson though.
i guess i better go... we're off to home depot AGAIN!!!

ugh...what did we get ourselves into?!!