Best Laid Plans and other random bits

Okay, so I last wrote on Thursday ... what's happened since then?

Friday -- We cleaned the house and fed the missionaries. We had nachos. If I do that again, I want a fondue pot or something that can handle a can of Sterno underneath it. The cheese sauce (melted Velveeta with some salsa tossed in) kept cooling and congealing. Not so fun. But it was tasty. It was a meal that Bruise actually ATE, so that was a huge success, no?

Saturday -- Cleaned the church building. One gal had come and cleaned the night before (since she had to work that morning), so Michael and I emptied the garbages in the classrooms, vacuumed the classrooms, and cleaned the four bathrooms that hadn't been cleaned. Oh, and I wiped out the drinking faucets. (For those of you not in the know, ward members are assigned to clean the ward buildings. And there are lists of what duties you need to do. In our building, we have three wards. Each is assigned one sheet of duties. One will have to wash windows, pick up any garbage outside, and vacuum and sweep the chapel and hallways and cultural hall and stage. Another ward will be assigned to clean the bathrooms, serving area (like a kitchen -- except we're not supposed to do meal prep in there. Legal reasons, you know? Crazy litigious society that we live in!), and vacuum the classrooms and empty the garbages there. ... I don't really know what all the other ward is assigned. We've only ever been cleaning the building when we've had either of those two sheets of responsibilities. ... And, after you (and whatever other people in your ward) are done with your sheet ... and you've signed off on all the duties, you call the person assigned over it and report to him. And you're done!

After that, we took the kids home for a nap. Which they didn't take. :(
Then, in the afternoon, there was a free nutrition workshop at the local library. With FREE CHILDCARE. Bruise happily played at the library's train table for about an hour and a half. Happy as a pig in the mud. Bucket would go back and forth between playing in the children's section of the library and then coming to sit with us in the presentation room/storytime room.

And, since she was with us when the food was served (our presenter, from OSU Extension Services made a healthy chili and pear quesadillas. Yum!) and was happily chowing down, we had our picture taken and put in the paper.

There we are. You can JUST see Michael's sleeve next to Bucket. Luckily, our names aren't attached to the image (they were in the paper, so I'm not giving you the link for that. Sorry! Just trying to protect my sweet babies from potential Weirdos (of the nasty-nasty sort)), so I can share the picture with you.

Truly, I think I look horrible. I'm not wearing a lick of make-up and the bold red of my jacket's totally reflecting off my pale-pale-glow-in-the-dark skin. And, heavens above, but could I smile? If I smiled and lifted my chin, I'd avoid looking so fat-in-the-face. *sigh* I know. I'm my worst and cattiest critic. Oh well. (I just REALLY need to work out. *sigh*)

Sunday wasn't all that eventful ... still enjoying the Family History course that we're in. I still have my work cut out for me. But, hey! It looks like there's been some work done on my mom's side. Work that she and I haven't done ... cool, huh?

Now, to yesterday. I had great plans for yesterday. I was going to get up, clean the house -- finish up the dishes, fold some laundry, vacuum, dust the living room, sweep/dust mop ...

Well, I did dust the living room. And I did a load of dishes. Everything else? Fell by the wayside.
I read with the kids. A chapter of The Book of Mormon (hey, we have to start somewhere, right?) and some Mo Willems books. We love us some pigeon books ... and anything else he writes, really. ^_^ I think we're going to have to buy his whole oeuvre of kids' books.

Bruise did take a nap when I asked. But Bucket? WAS. NOT. GONNA. HAPPEN.

Eventually, I really just lost it. She was in her room most of the day, SCREAMING and throwing tantrums ... even after Michael got home and took her for a drive. During which they discussed "Princess Behavior."

I did have dinner made. And, per Michael's suggestions before he was able to come home, she spent a while in the naughty chair in my bathtub so that I could keep an eye on her while I showered (there's a separate shower stall in the master bath).

It was NOT a very good day. At all.

But Michael, bless his heart, brought home ice cream for me (and him). He totally deserved it, too, with how much she screamed and fussed. We didn't read story-story (A chapter of "The Last Battle"). She, due to her attitude, also didn't get to listen to the scripture story. Bruise and I cuddled, him on my lap, and read about Christ and the ten lepers together.

I had remarked to Michael that, after a day like today ... Well, I almost wished that Bruise was an only child. He was SO good. At one point, I was in their room, sitting next to Bucket, in the hopes that she'd settle down and FALL FRICKIN' ASLEEP (which, you can surmise, she DIDN'T). Bruise stirred from his nap, turned over, saw me, grinned and waved at me, then rolled back over and went right back to sleep.

When he woke up, yes, I let him out of their room to play. He deserved it. And, gosh, he handled it well that the DVD player isn't working, so he couldn't watch the show that he wanted (usually the kids FUSS like nobody's business when something like this occurs -- usually a DVD from the libraries won't play. And I have to withstand the WHINE of DEATH). Bruise, though? He took it in stride (what a GOOD nap can do!!) ... and, instead, he played without a show. And was very happy to watch the kids' programming on OPB.

When I had told Michael how GOOD Bruise had been, Michael -- ever the optimist -- told Bruise, "You've been a very sweet boy. Don't let it go to your head."
(Yes, I LOVE my husband.)

Bucket, however ... well, I think that she ended up getting tired out enough by all the fussing and whining and SCREAMING that she finally went to bed around 8:30. When, usually she's nodding off in bed around 8PM. *sigh*

And then she threw up this morning. Into the toilet. I'm SURE it was due to the stress that was yesterday. She had a few cold showers and a few spankings and a few timeouts. Okay, a HELL OF A LOT of timeouts.

Yeah. I'm still ready for a nap. And a working perfectly DVD player. I mean, really, it's just over a year old. What's the deal with technology HATING me so much this year? Especially when I love my technology so????? *sigh*

So, yeah. If you can just pray that Bucket will return to the sweet princess that she usually is ... and that technology stops hating me. And, hey, if you can give me tips to motivate myself to exercise. And get off my duff and get the laundry folded. And how to stay sane ... well, sane-ish, anyways, I'd REALLY, REALLY appreciate it.

Just about as much as I appreciated Michael's bringing me a pint of "Americone Dream" (since, dude, it's got a picture of STEPHEN COLBERT on it!! :D Yup, I got myself a keeper. ^_^)