Leprosy: It's the new accessory...

So, do we all remember my magnificent new tanning find?

Um yeah - about that...

Well, I figured out why it was on clearance...

If you can manage to spray it on perfectly evenly - it works great. But if you miss spots... Let's just say I have arms that only Mother Theresa could love:

I put a little vaseline over my elbow so it wouldn't get too dark and apparently I spead it around in quite the abstract shape. Also, I missed the entire underneath back side of my arms. Then in an effort to "fix" it - I applied the Neutrogena foam self-tanning lotion on the white spots. Apparently - the Neutrogena is a darker color than the spray on and now my arms are like a patchwork quilt! Good thing it isn't the hottest weekend of the year - otherwise I might not want to wear long sleeves. Oh, wait...

Here's how my feet are looking after various sandals have rubbed parts of the tan off:


[At least my nails are fabulous.]

So - perhaps there IS something to this whole old-school notion of actually laying out in the sun itself.

And now I'm off to an outdoor birthday party in almost 90 degree heat to show off my hideous splotches tan...

"Heat exhaustion claims Mother of Four..News at 11."

That is a photo of the temperature INSIDE my home!

That would be WITH the ghetto blankets tacked up over the west-facing windows.How in the world do you people who live in hot climates survive exactly? I literally cannot move - as in barely function. It is so hot, it is exhausting to do anything.

Hubby has the 2 older kids at a swim meet. "No thanks honey - I'll pass on 4 hours at a humid indoor pool packed with a couple of hundred people!" Although - I think my house is actually hotter than the pool building. I got stuck with the wonder twins tonight "M-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-M, he touched me!!!!" *talk to the hand*

Last Friday night I got to sit on bleachers at the pool for 4 hours with those 2. That was about the time I decided that swim meets are not my favorite thing. Can you say let's go potty 5 separate times? Can you say "Let's try to jump into the deep end during a race!"? So, instead I sit here - in the sauna, with the freakatrons.

Well, the very bright spot of this week was that from 9am - noon for 5 days straight - I experienced TOTAL peace & quiet! Thank you VBS - you are my very best friend! Dach was FINALLY old enough to go! YIPPEE!!! I sorted/purged/scrubbed/organized my ENTIRE basement. You don't look very impressed. The WHOLE ENTIRE basement!!! As in - the place where we throw everything in a heap to "deal with later".

My husband walked down the stairs today and screamed like a school girl. "WHAT'S WRONG?!" He looked up the stairs and smiled "This is the absolute cleanest our basement has EVER been in the 2 1/2 yrs we've lived here!!!" *Imagine how clean the WHOLE house would be if I shipped our children off to school every day!!* I did discover something quite appalling in the basement during my cleaning...

poop.

Cat poop to be exact. Ask me if we have a cat. No we don't, thanks for asking. I found it in 3 different places. Some evil devil cat snuck into our house and pooped. *???* Evil devil cat! That -my people- is exactly WHY I don't have a pet! Because I have no desire to clean up the poop of even just 1 more living being!!!!! Go figure I would get a pooping cat so lazy it didn't even bother to kill any rats while it was here! Nice. [BTW: The rats are totally gone now - 3 months and counting!]

Anyway - the basement is clean. I filled a 15 passenger van with stuff for the dump. I half-filled our minivan with stuff to donate to Goodwill and I consigned a large plastic bin of clothing. All from the basement.

I'd show you before and after pictures but I didn't even think to take before pictures. It would basically be a picture of a basement FULL almost to the ceiling of misc. crap!!

And I'm too woozy from the heat to navigate the stairs to take an after picture at this moment. It would basically be a picture of a basement - clean.

So, use your imagination.

I should be cleaning the upstairs right now - if I had one iota of energy. Tomorrow - outdoor birthday party for nephew. Did I mention it'll be over 90 degrees? Perhaps I'll get him a slurpee and a case of sunblock. Hubby's sis and family arrives from Montana tomorrow. Sunday is church, all church picnic in the park with music, face-painting, balloons and swimming (should be fun) then directly afterwards we are having a BBQ at our house with Hubby's family & his best friend from high school & his family (also visiting from Montana). Then Monday - Friday another week-long round of VBS at a different church (after daily swim team practice from 8am-8:45am for the older kids, of course)! We leave Thursday for our all-church retreat. The staff gets to go down a day earlier than everyone else and hang out! Fun!

Ok - I have to figure out if I am going to stay in the hot house here or take these 2 to somewhere air conditioned. I could put them to bed at 7:30pm and get some stuff done - or we could leave for a couple of hours to cool off. Decisions, decisions... Those 2 in a store is somewhat toxic to the system but it would be much cooler.

I do believe I'm feeling a little bit snarky today. The heat does that to me. I'd never make it on Survivor. I'm a total disaster just being overheated - let alone being afflicted with bugs, no sleep and starving!! No thanks, I'm trying to cut down...

Sinks, sinks, everywhere...

"scraaaaaaaaape...clunk,clunk....ouch...scraaaaaaaaape...clunk,clunk...ouch"


The sound of a 31" wide bathroom sink with vanity attached being dragged down the street by one determined Photo Mommy! The little treasure was out front of the neighbors house (2 houses down) with a free sign on it! Now the “funny” thing is that I looked at Hubby a week ago and announced “I AM going to find a free sink for our basement on craigslist in the next 2 weeks!” Well, last Sunday I found one on craigslist & it was a perfect fit on top of our vanity. I spent all Sunday night ripping out the old sink:





Um…YUCK!!! [Soon to be visiting SIL – are you glad to see that thing leave your “private guest bath”?!]



After installation – here is the new look:







A vast improvement! The sink actually comes clean when you wash it – versus a permanent “I’m-older-than-your-grandma” yellow stain.

So I was satisfied – mission accomplished!

Until I saw the neighbor’s sink on the side of the road yesterday! “I think that sink is nicer than MY sink! I want THAT sink!” I got the kids settled for rest time and started to walk over to examine it. Right then someone drove up and parked in front of it and got out to look at it. “HEY! That’s MY sink!!” *No – I didn’t yell that!* I tried to play it cool by the mailbox for a while. The lady got back in her car & started making phone calls. She FINALLY left and I went running down the street to claim my sink. “She probably realized she couldn’t lift it herself & went to go get someone to help her. I have to HURRY before she comes back!!”

Can I just say that sinks weigh about 9 million pounds? I dragged/carried/lugged it the 30(?) yards back to the house. Let’s just say I heard and felt my back go out! “Ah, laminated pressboard – what a lightweight invention – let’s attach it to porcelain and drag it down the street!”

When I got it back to the yard *“MINE!!!”* I got the brilliant idea to transport it to the backyard on a skateboard. Somewhat functional/somewhat harrowing. Now I WISH I would have taken a before picture because the vanity itself was U-G-L-Y. Fake oak over pressboard ugly. But what a little black paint can do! I sanded, primed and painted that baby and had it ready for installation in under 2 hours! So I hung up my “Parental Do Not Disturb” sign aka: “That’s right kids – today is X-BOX day! And help yourself to whatever junkie snacks you can find – Mommy is on a mission!”

I present to you – the finished product:








Notice the difference in the quality of faucets between the sinks! *contented sigh*


Ok – I’ve got 90 minutes to put away groceries, make dinner and get 2 kids to a swim meet…

WOW!!!

Be sure to check out the previous entry for pics of my groovy new purchases...

Ok - on to the BIG story...

-4pm Yesterday-

(phone rings)

Hubby: “Hello?”

An automated voice on the other end: “This is Sears delivery service confirming a scheduled delivery tomorrow between 11am-1pm…”

Hubby (to me): “Did we order anything from Sears to be delivered?”

Me: “No.”

Hubby: “Idiots.”

*click*

-10:45am Today-

(my cell phone rings)

Me: “Hello?”

Live person on the other end: “Hello this is Sears delivery calling to confirm a delivery time between 11am-1pm today…”

Me: “Sorry – I think there’s been a mistake – we didn’t order anything from Sears.” *That’s weird – how would they even have my cell phone number – only friends & family have that…?*

Sears Lady: “It’s a gift.”

Me: “What? What could it possibly be?”

Sears Lady: “It’s a refrigerator.”

*BLINK*

Me: “WHAT?!?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?! SOMEONE IS GIVING US A FRIDGE?!?!!?!?!?!!!!!!!”

Me: “Who is it from?”

Sears Lady: “The giver wants to remain anonymous. Will you be home between 11am-1pm?”

Me: “I will be NOW!!”

-12pm Today-

I had raced home and moved my fridge out of the fridge spot and scrubbed up the dusty “sludge” underneath when my hero the delivery man showed up at the door. He took some measurements and said “Ok – I’ll be right back with your fridge!”

OH. MY. STARS.

Would you care to see the BEE-YOU-TEE-FUL monstrosity that he brought into my house?!?! Imagine his surprise when I yelled “IS THAT THE MOST BEAUTIFUL FRIDGE YOU’VE EVER SEEN?!?” I was so excited that I could NOT calm down. I do believe by the time he left my house he was afraid of me!

Ok – are you ready? *squeals* Here it is:

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Are you as floored as I am? I don’t even know what to say. Our old fridge was functional - just small. I always had it packed to the gills.

Maybe someone who had been to my house – got sick of watching stuff fall out everytime I opened it!

I think it was around 18 cubic feet. The new one is 26 cubic feet!!

I have NEVER -in my whole life, even from family- never received a gift of this magnitude! I am astounded, simply astounded. And it just -SLAYS- me that I don’t know who to thank...

COUCH-O-RAMA...

We were shopping at a local thrift store when I spied the groovy little number below…

In the basement office/guest room:

Before:

And after:

This one shows the color a little bit better:

It’s kind of a muscle car paint color. “Shimmery bronze”. Sort of reminds me of….my SKIN COLOR!! *smiles happily* Can you say vast improvement on the groove-o-meter?! It actually has a trundle underneath and converts into a full sized bed. GA-ROO-VIE!!! [Hey SIL - welcome to your new digs when you visit! 11 days and counting!! Hey - the kids say PLEASE BRING THE DOG!!!] It was only $30, and we were able to turn around and sell the futon (pictured above *gag*) for $35 on craigslist. THEN…we spied the CUTEST couch on craigslist for $190. The drawback – it was located 90 minutes away. We didn’t get it – but would you like to see it?

I thought you might:

Red isn’t even really one of my colors (although my living room carpet has flowers on it) but I just thought it was SO cute! Plus the gal had bought it at Pier 1 Imports 9 months ago and it was in great condition.

I did -however- find this couch for only $50 and only 10-15 minutes from our house:
[Excuse Colonel Ding-Dong’s head in the corner]

It isn’t wonderfully comfortable but I like the look. I like that there aren’t a thousand pillows on it to throw all over the floor to jump on! The last couch we bought (the one pictured in the previous entry) was bought PURELY on comfort and not on appearance. I have since learned that I have to look at my couch a lot more often than I get to sit on my couch and I’d rather have something I enjoy looking at. Plus - I went to IKEA today and bought crome legs for it.

Ok – now on to the GIANORMOUS news of the day: Wait! This story is so big – it needs it’s own entry…

The Couch...

*Checks under doormat "Drat!"*

Last night I placed the following ad on craigslist.com:

"FREE COUCH!! CHA-CHING! We just got a new couch and need to get rid of this one. If it were up to me, I would have sold it for at least $75-$100 but (lucky for you) Hubby said –and I quote- “I don’t want to deal with selling it – I want it out of the house right now.” And then he promptly carried it to the driveway.

We don’t have pets so it doesn’t have any “mystery scents” or allergy inducing pet stuff. But we do have kids - so if you find a matchbox car or a Polly Pocket shoe – just consider it our free bonus gift to you!

So – there you have it – a perfectly good couch for free because we are too tired to care about dealing with selling it! So, you may have my couch – not for the price of 20 lattes (as I’d hoped!) but simply for free! Can you even beat that?!

PS – I wouldn’t cry if I woke up and found a Starbucks giftcard under my doormat. I'm just saying..."



The couch is gone - but the doormat is bare. *sigh*

Admit one SIX...

So - slightly bad news. We are going on vacation to Disneyland in October. My dear friend who's husband works at Disney had -THOUGHT- that they could get 5 people into Disneyland for free when they go. Apparently they can get 5 people in for free each day...total. Not in addition to their family...just total. So, our big plans of the 11 of us going to frolick about Disneyland for free (save one of my kids whom I'd have to pay for) have just become extremely inflated!

She could take us there (without her family) and get herself and 4 people in our family in for free. 5 people per day...total. So, instead of $50 per day. We could be looking at upwards of $700 in ticket prices for 3 fun filled days at Disneyland! I'd love to know how people afford to go on vacations!
I have spent -more time than I'd like to admit- online today researching discounted tickets.

Apparently, I can get 4 3-day park hopper passes if I sign up with an online marketing company and through them join: the Nick Jr. book club, BMG music club, Columbia House DVD club; reserve & pay for my 2007 entertainment book, order satellite tv, dental insurance, and web hosting and refinance my car that is already paid off. THEN -and only then- can I get the kind of discount I was hoping for.

At least we'll save a lot of money by driving down. In a van. With 6 people. 4 of which who have limited to no social skills. For 20 hours. I fail to see where the vacation IS in that plan. Vacation from sanity...?

ex·ces·sive: going beyond a normal limit

On a whim I decided to clean out the freezer.

79

79 popsicles floating around that freezer.

79!!

Does that seem excessive in any way? Yeah, I thought so. Of course that's not counting the 16 push-ups and the 11 quarts of "Dreamery" ice cream crammed in there. *Hey! Don't judge me! That ice cream was on clearance for .50 cents each!*

There seemed to be an inordinate amount of orange popsicles in the mix. Apparently, they are the "undesirable" flavor in this house. My kids are always quick to offer them to their friends when they are visiting! *kindness at work* Perhaps we'll have to include them in more than the "after dinner" treat category. I could always wrap a pancake around one and call it breakfast: "popsicle in a blanket"! I could melt all of the orange ones down & try to convince the family that it's orange juice.

Do you think if I dipped them in peanut butter, I could pass them off for lunch. Really - how much worse can they be for you than grape jelly?

I also found 27 Boca Burgers (left over from a BBQ). Gee, vegetables. Yum. Did I mention I'm an ANTI-vegetarian?

Ah yes - then there was the 6 pounds of bacon. COME TO MAMA!! *blows kisses dreamily at freezer*

Excessive is my middle name. Or perhaps it's my first name...