Since we last spoke....

Hey Y'all! I hope things are well your way today. We're still snowed/iced in. I think we're getting a touch of cabin fever.
Here's my updates since we last spoke:
*Daddy came home from the hospital Tuesday night. He is on eight different medicines, but I think they're keeping his blood pressure down and out of the danger zone. Thanks for praying for him and for us.
*Coughed and sneezed my head off all day Wednesday at school. Called in a substitute teacher for Thursday. Ended up staying out of school Friday too. I had a fever of 100.9 which is SUPER high for me as I usually run a low body temp.
*Had to pick up Robbie from daycare on Friday afternoon because Big Daddy works for the NC Dept. of Transportation and they had to work over getting roads salted. Me and Robbie went to the library and the grocery store on the way home. Spent way too much money at the grocery store anticipating getting snowed in.
*Carried in a little firewood for the fireplace just in case we lost power. Power has stayed on the whole time, but my big toe hurts as I have stumped it on the wood twice!
*Made homemade playdough with Robbie and loved it!
*Made homemade dishwasher detergent and homemade laundry detergent. Loved it and plan on using it more. Links will come later for the recipes.
*Working on catching up the laundry now that I have all of that soap! ha ha
*Played lots of games with Robbie indoors. I can't take him outside to play in the snow because he's snotty as am I.
*Made and ate LOTS of snow cream!
*Worried about my mama as she works 3rd shift at Wal-Mart in the deli. She got snowed in and had to sleep in her car and in the breakroom. She's home safe now but is slap worn out.
*Laughed my head off at Robbie last night as he came in here naked as a jaybird wearing only a cowboy hat, announcing that he was playing dress-up.
*Got woke up at 5:30 this morning ...Big Daddy called and said that he hit an ice spot in the road, spun around 180 degrees, and landed in a ditch. A man who lived nearby was kind enough to pull his truck out with his tractor. Thank God there are still a few nice guys left!
*Played on Facebook until I could puke.
*Cooked a LOT and have eaten lots!
*Plan on doing some crochet today!
*Realized my camera card reader is in my purse in the van, but promising to show pictures as soon as I can get down my icy back steps!
What's going on in your neck of the woods today? You snowed in?

Prayers for Daddy

Hey Y'all! I hope you're having a wonderful week so far. This past Thursday ended our first semester, so Friday and Monday were Teacher's Workdays. I had planned on working Friday and then taking off Monday. Thursday morning my daddy had a dr. appt that was encouraged by me and my sister. Daddy has really high blood pressure and was having some issues and some chest/neck pains. Thus the appt....
When he finally got to see the doctor, she checked his blood pressure and it was 210/144. She sent him home to get some things together and then to the hospital. Upon admittance, they checked it again and it was 250/122. He was immediately put into ICU on the heart floor and they began an IV with a Nitro drip--this continued for 36 hours. Finally on Saturday night, he was put into a regular room. Monday, they gave him a stress test via IV and we are STILL waiting on the results. If nothing shows up, they're supposed to send him home. If something DOES show up, we'll go from there. I've had my Facebook family and the rest of my friends and family praying for my daddy, and now I'm asking y'all. Some of y'all are regulars and know how close my family is. My daddy is aggravated and is wanting to come home. Mama just texted me his information...BP is 136/76, pluse is 50 and oxygen levels are in the 90s. This is good for now, so we wait. Would you please join my family in prayer in hopes that God will work everything out for Daddy?
Thanks!

Terrific Thursday

Hey Y'all! I hope you've had a great week so far. We've really been enjoying the North Carolina Pre-Spring weather this week....until today...it's cold and rainy out, but the nice warm sunshine was great while it lasted!
Me and Big Daddy were able to get Robbie's bedroom cleaned out this past Saturday! I am so happy to have that huge, black cloud moved from over my head! Woo-Hoo! I do have to apologize though, because I didn't take any before/after pictures, but trust me it is amazing how good it looks now and how organized everything is. To give you an idea of just how horrible it was, we got 4 LARGE/HUGE/INDUSTRIAL SIZED trash bags of old toys, game pieces, flash cards, trash, junk, etc. and 3 LARGE/HUGE/INDUSTRIAL SIZED trash bags of clothes, shoes, and coats that are too small! Bless it--poor youngin' ain't got a thing! ha ha Also, I wish you could have been there when he came home from Pop-Pop and Mimi's house to find his clean room. He said, "Mama! You cleaned up my room! It's so clean, I can't stand it!" ...and he said that in a good way!
The rest of the weekend was great and it was so nice having Monday off. Thanks MLK! I thought I would get in my office/craft room and de-clutter and clean it out....Big Daddy and Robbie took a little drive to visit with Big Daddy's mom. On the way over there, he called me to tell me that he was in the middle of getting a speeding ticket--that's all I'm going to say on that matter---I'm really really really ticked that he got a ticket...ok--I'm done.
Finally, I've been doing a little crafting here and there this week to keep my mouth clamped shut around Big Daddy. I'm too scared I'm going to be ugly and gripe about the ticket again, so I find something to do!
Here's what's kept me busy this week:
I crocheted a New Mini Scarf
I crocheted a new washcloth--loving this!!
Finished crocheting a LONG scarf
Made the cutest ever 'tissue paper twirls' heart and then glittered it!
Searched the web for a cute little heart crochet pattern...Found it! Besides that speeding ticket, that we won't mention again...things have been great this week!
Tomorrow is a teacher's workday, so I'm looking forward to catching up on some stuff at school! As far as cleaning goes, this is our weekend off....enjoy it!
Be Blessed,
Michelle

Happy Friday!

Hey Y'all!
Ooh...the sun is shining today and it's mildly warm outside, and I'm in the mood for SPRING already! I think they're calling for the possibility of snow late tomorrow night, but I'm just taking a minute to enjoy the beauty of this day!
I have my classroom door open and am enjoying my time between classes.
Yesterday I went to The Dollar General store in my hometown and bought some Christmas items that were 70% off! I got this little tub of glass ornaments for 30 cents!
I just KNEW there had to be something I could use them for! (haha) I'm hoping I'm not the only one guilty of doing the same thing? Nah...if nobody else, my mama does it too! SO anyway... I covered them with Elmer's glue and doussed some with pink glitter and some with red glitter! Oh, how I love me some GLITTER! Anyway...today I took more glue and more glitter and made a heart on one and some polka dots on the other:While I was playing with glitter, I cut out a large heart and did some glittering on the paper heart! Cute, right?
Recently I paid a little visit to our local thrift store and bought the Parcheesi game below and the Boggle game for $2 each. Cha-Ching----SCORE!
AND....while there I got this old hymn book for fifty cents. I hope to use the music pages for some crafts, but seriously...It's going to be very hard to mess with it...as a piano player and all....
Say a prayer for us tomorrow please. Me and Big Daddy are going to tackle Robbie's bedroom and get things cleaned out--but I'm not thinking about that yet---I'm concentrating on my HOT DATE with Big Daddy tonight.....Yee-Haw!Have a wonderful weekend!

Pure-T Cute!

Ok...as promised, here's the CUTEST Post EVER!
Yesterday, after picking up Robbie from daycare, we made our weekly trip to the library. He LOVES me reading to him every night at bedtime. I always get a minimum of 21 books which is 3/night. It seemed that I needed a little more than 21 and my big library book basket was super heavy and really full! After we checked out everything, I turned around and there was Big Daddy coming in the door of the library! Woo-Hoo! I "let" him carry the heavy books to the minivan. Instead of going straight home, I stopped in to check on my cousin, Kelly, who had some surgery this past Friday. She has a daughter who is six months older than Robbie. They adore each other and have always played really well together. After visiting for a little bit, it was time to head home. Both kids didn't want to be seperated from each other, so Anna Kate came over to our house for a little bit! This is the first time Robbie's had somebody over for a few hours to play and man was it a HOOT!
We started off by watching about, oh let's say, 15 minutes of "Everybody's Hero"--a Disney movie...I have the feelin' they're both a little ADHD....since it didn't last that long! Hee hee!

Afterwards, there was a little bit of playing Robbie's games from Christmas. They played Elefun, GoFish, Carribou Island, and some little monkey game. Anna Kate was beside herself at how messy Robbie's room is. She was fussing at him and told him how he needed to get that mess cleaned up! He was fussing right back and told her that he LIKES messy rooms! It was SOO funny!
Then it was SUPPER TIME! WOOHOO! I had a Chef Boyardee Family Size Pizza kit so I pulled it out and knew we were in for a great time!

After making the dough, and setting it aside so it could rise, I got the kids ready to make their pizzas!

Then I had to make sure their aprons were tied correctly and I took advantage of a fun picture taking opportunity!
Told ya, aren't they cute??
Then after the dough had risen enough, I spread it out on two different pans, gave each of them a spoon and let each one get the sauce spread out onto the dough. Then came pepperoni and cheese time! They were sooo precious, and Big Daddy caught one of them sneaking pepperoni's instead of putting them on the pizza....hee hee

Finally they were done and it was time to put the pizzas in the oven! Is this precious or what?!
Now we had to wait on our pizzas to get done...that was the HARD part!

YAY! It's ready!
Sayin' the blessing!
And...we ALL give it a THUMBS UP!
Finally, it was time for Kate-Kate to go home. Robbie wouldn't get off of his tricycle long enough to really hug her, so she had to "make-do" with what she got! Thanks Kate-Kate for coming to hang out and for making pizzas with us! Come back ANYTIME!

Y'all have a GREAT day today! Enjoy the little things!

Hey Hey Hey!

You just HAD to say the title just like Dwayne on "What's Happenin'" said too ok?
Say what? You don't know how Dwayne was? For Real? How's THIS to jog your memory? He's the one on the LEFT! For the record, I LOVE this show! I have all three seasons on DVD and the first season of "What's Happenin' NOW" on DVD too! My kids love it at school when we have a day off--they just don't make TV shows like they used to, right? Every single episode teaches some type of life lesson.
So...I hope you're having a good week so far.
I doubt I'm going to be able to type long tonight because of several reasons, but the main one is the fact that I spilled a giant glass of Sweet Tea all over my keyboard about 30 minutes ago and I'm not sure how long it's going to be before all of the keys start sticking! I know it's going to be happening too because if you've ever had Big Daddy's tea, you'd totally understand.
I do want to say that I am so excited about my post for tomorrow. It's the cutest, most sweetest one ever, and, of course it involves Robbie, so PLEASE come back tomorrow and see it!
Oh...meant to tell y'all that my classroom's new floor is AMAZING! I mentioned in an earlier post that they would be putting down new tile over Christmas break. I just KNEW it was going to be BRITE WHITE, but Thanks be to GOD it's not! It's the most beautiful shade of blue and let me tell ya...all the teachers are jealous of it too! Ha Ha Ha...leave it to me to have a bunch of teachers coming in and out of the classroom just to see my tile and tell me how much they wish their rooms looked like mine! Too funny!
Ok y'all---I'm outta here!
Robbie just said, "Mama, you know what? I love you!" Could life get any better? I think NOT...unless, of course, you have brand new blue tile in YOUR classroom too!
Have a great night!

And THAT Y'all.....is THAT!

Hey y'all! I hope you've had a wonderful weekend and that you rang in the New Year with lots of friends and family surrounding you. Also, there's something magical about that New Year's kiss that happens at, oh let's say, 12:00:02. I sure do love me some of my Big Daddy and I love kissing him anyway--but somehow---that kiss symbolizes that we've made it through another year and that with God's help, we'll make it through this one too!
Now...for the Doublewide Clean Sweep saga....
This past Saturday our plans were to clean out Robbie's room. Before you get really excited, it didn't happen...so there....
We did, however, get the den and dining room cleaned out, did a little rearranging with some furniture, and I got ALL of the laundry done.
I'm happy with that. You have NO idea how happy my family will be now that the piano has been moved from the living room (where NOBODY dares to go) back to the den.
I love playing it and now that Robbie understands that he CANNOT touch it unless I'm with him, it's ok to have it back in the den. In case you're a piano geek like me, it's a Kawai CN41 digital piano and there are so many tricks to it, but I'm working on getting it all figured out!
As far as this post's title....that's that...Christmas vacation is over. I'm not sure if I'm ready to go back or not. The past two weeks with Robbie all day has been wonderful. I just love waking up with him around 9:30 and hanging out, doing whatever.
The school system had brand new WHITE tile (yea...what WERE they thinking?), installed in my classroom over the break. I am NOT looking forward to unpacking everything while trying to get everything together in my mind to actually get some TEACHING done!
Oh well....12 Saturdays until Spring Break! hee hee
Have a great week!

Big Daddy's Big Idea!

Hey Y'all! First of all I want to wish each and every one of you a HAPPY 2010!!!
We rang in the new year last night at my best friend's house! We had such a good time and we all took food over there because truly, what's a New Year's Eve party without some grub, right?!
I took ham biscuits, chocolate covered peanuts, chocolate Mounds balls, and a marinated salad. Can we all say YUMMY?!!
Anyway--we rang in the new year and enjoyed J-Lo shakin' it on TV just before the countdown---ok not really...but...yep...
We came home and went straight to bed. I finally knocked out around 2:15 am. I had to be up this morning and be at The Cracker Barrel at 9:00 am to meet my girlfriends from school. We all grew up together and had a great time chatting at breakfast and doing a little shopping afterwards. I think I got home around 1:30 which was great...still plenty of day left!
I went into the kitchen and got the black eyed peas ready. Threw a huge ham bone in the pot with them and let them cook all day!
There were 8 of us here for supper tonight and the menu consisted of:
Ham biscuits (leftover from last night)
black-eyed peas
Turnip and collard greens, mixed
Fried hog jowls
cornbread muffins
and Big Daddy's Sweet tea!
I am so full still that I could bust--literally!
After taking mammaw her medicine and getting her tucked in for the night, I've found that I'm pooped!
I started a new crochet scarf right after dinner. My daddy was trying to mess me up while I was doing 202 chain stitches to start it. I did end up having to pull all of the stitches out and start over, but only once....my daddy knows what's good for him and when it's time to stop! hahaha
Now...to explain the title of this post!
Me and Big Daddy were talking tonight about our plans for tomorrow.
Robbie's bedroom is a war-zone, disaster area, pig-sty, whirlwind/tornado aftermath, etc. You get the picture, right?
For all of you that have had a 3 year old-going on 18-little boy, you should totally get what I'm sayin'!
So....tomorrow we tackle his room.
There is a man who works with him who has a son about a year younger than Robbie. He's going to meet up with Big Daddy tomorrow night to get loaded up with clothes that no longer will fit Robbie. Y'all---that boy is growing so fast, we can't keep up with his wardrobe! As soon as I think he's set, he'll hit a growing spell and we need to go up a size in everything!
So, after we get everything done, that will be one room cleaned out!
Big Dadddy's plan is this: Every Saturday, one room gets cleaned out! I counted Saturdays on the calendar, and there are 13 Saturdays until Spring Break.
Here are the rooms that will be worked on:
1. Robbie's Room
2. Guest Bedroom (IT'S THE WORST!)
3. My office/craft room
4. Both Bathrooms
5. Our kitchen
6. Living room/den
7. Our Bedroom
That leaves us 6 Saturdays to enjoy ourselves too! I think we'll do every other Saturday so that we don't go plum crazy!
Y'all, I am a major pack-rat, hoarder, what have you.
This has to stop.
I cannot have a path through rooms and it's almost that bad.
To make myself accountable, I'm going to resolve, (yup--the dreaded ole New Year's Resolution)
to make sure these rooms are cleaned out and de-cluttered, so that my new floors that have been in the living room for a year now, can be put down during spring break.
I promise to post before and after pictures so that you can see what a huge undertaking it is.
It will be very hard for me to do this--because it show's how much I've neglected this house and how much time has been spent on the computer playing stupid Farmville and Fish World, and Bubble Pop, and Farkle, and Fishville....etc.
No more of all of that! It's plumb crazy.
Be sure to come back tomorrow night for our before and after of Robbie's room!
Have a great Saturday!