happy birthday mali....

It is 14 degrees out...but the sun is shining, and it is supposed to be 30 degrees by noon AND sunny....so we'll take it.

Why is it that I feel compelled to take care of so many things around here all at once? Blah. And Paul is in Boston. He is coming home for the weekend, working at the Dome, then going back to Boston. So if I want to paint or do things around here, I just have to go for it.

My two little sweetie pies are up. They are such princesses. Charlotte Claire has her little pink dancing dress on, and Camille her pink footy jamas with froggies on them. They have dollhouse stuff set up all across the livingroom. They have Barbies with pretty dresses all over the couch. They just play and play and play....

Samuel didn't go to school today. He had a headache. He took an ibuprofen and went back to bed. Everyone else went.

Tereza, I shall put up some pictures of the bedroom when it is finished. The carpet in that room needs to be replaced. Horribly. It just isn't on the list. 20 years of being the Little Kids' Room. Different cast of characters, year in year out, marker stains and whatever else...they have never been allowed to eat in there, I can't imagine what it would look like if they did. Our windows are awful too. We need new ones throughout the whole house. Our house is only 20 years old, but the windows are rotting right through. We stripped the kitchen ones a few years back and restained them, put on new polyurethane, they still rot. So they look awful. You can scrub them, and the mold comes back. We are planning to replace them, but it is so very expensive. We will get vinyl ones this time.....

So for me, it is one thing to be inspired to work on the things that I can manage to improve, but I have to be careful not to get all out of rest about the things that I cannot change at this time. Paul is so busy with work and church stuff and whatever else he does, so I have to bide my time. Sometimes I feel like the house is falling down around us, but it isn't really. It is just that when I let myself get bothered by things, then it seems like they HAVE to be done NOW. I want the house to look like a magazine house, and it ain't gonna happen. It doesn't help that my sister has this new family room that is simply gorgeous...spacious and airy and cozy....no, I am not jealous! And my brother has a mudroom with room for hundreds of pairs of shoes and boots and coats galore! And a spare refridgerator, too! No, I am not jealous. I shall not let myself be. Instead I will remember the show that was on the other night about the pickpocket in India...so desperately poor. The house that family was crammed into, all crumbling and dingy.....

One of the little ones wet the bed last night....and the laundry mountain lives on.

Today we are making something vegetarian for dinner in honor of Mali's birthday. Maybe lasagna, or veggie stir-fry.

Cold...I am tired of being cold. brr. My fingers are cold. I know when I get busy I will warm up....seriously, I would love to go back to bed. I simply do not sleep well when Paul is not here. I wake up and wake up and wake up, then when it is morning, I can barely lift my head off the pillow...I would surely be able to sleep when it is time to get up.

And...this whole post has a Poor Me tone, so I better get my attitude adjusted....before I taint the whole family.....