Category: Uncategorized (Page 92 of 201)

I’ve been digging the house apart slowly finding junk and treasures… I’m starting to wear out, but I know I need to keep on keeping on!

Today’s Totals:  48 Toss / 55 Give

See, I’m making progress!  Slow progress.  But I haven’t even touched the basement yet. That’s the treasure chest!  😀

We were packing away the beach supplies the other day and I found a bag with “something” in it.  I was clever enough to store whatever it was in an air tight bag so I knew it was clean the next time I wanted it.  Unfortunately I put it inside a BLACK garbage bag, making it very difficult to guess what it was.  😀   oops.

We were all (especially Chloe and Josiah) happy to discover what was hiding in the bag!

It's the "Inflatable Ball Thingy!" There's a spot to drop the balls in the top and they come roooooooollllllliiiiiinnnnggg down.

We had this when Chloe was younger and she loved it--especially when her cousins were around to play with her in it. So this time around is awesome since Josiah always has Chloe to play with!

And speaking of old treasures… I’m on a mission this fall to get rid of the extra “junk” floating around in our house.  I’m calling it the “Fall 500 Purge.”  I’m going to throw away 250 items and give away 250 items.  I suppose if I’m really ambitious I could have a garage sale… but we’ll see what kind of things I find… and how long it takes me…  As of right now I’m up to 12 toss / 27 give.  I have a ways to go!

I'm no longer blonde!

I had been toying with the idea of changing my hair color for a while but I couldn’t get the guts up to actually try anything until now–my roots were really starting to show, so I either had to dye it blonde again or do something different.

So, different it was.

And by different I mean DARK.

After I washed out the dye and stood up to look at myself in the mirror I admit I was a bit surprised at how black it looks when wet.  It was at that point that I thought…. hmmmm… what have I done?

But hey, it’s only hair, right?  And you only live once.  So, why not?

I’m still not 100% sure I like it, but I’m going to let it be for a week or two and see how I feel about it then.  And it’s really okay if you don’t like it.  🙂  Tim isn’t crazy about it.  He’s says it’s too dark.  At least that’s what he said just after I dyed it yesterday.  I’ll give him a few more days of getting used to it and see what he thinks then.

I have one more post I’m going to write about wrapping up our Texas trip but that will have to wait until Thursday.  This week has been and still is jam packed with stuff…

Sunday: Happy (late) Birthday Dad!  I love you! I’m sorry I didn’t get around to posting anything until today…

Monday: Lesson Sign-Up day.  It was a crazy morning returning more emails and phone calls than I care to count.  But after hours of work everything is finally in place.  Then I taught all afternoon and evening.

Tuesday: Lessons all day.  For some reason everyone decided they wanted a lesson today, so I taught 19 lessons today.  That’s a lot of lessons! Now I have to get ready for tomorrow…

Wednesday: Heading over to Tomah (and picking up two girlfriends along the way) which is a 4 1/2 hour drive so see one of my friends from High School who just had a baby.  I’ll be gone all day.

Thursday: A day to relax.  No wait, I do have a couple lessons that night… oh, and we have to make a card for our nanny who is heading back to Utah on Saturday.  Chloe was really sad that we didn’t have a card to give her today since it was her last day watching the kids and I knew we wouldn’t have time until Thursday, so I agreed to help her make a card to give her before she leaves.

Friday: Off to St. Cloud for the afternoon/evening to help Shannon who is having surgery (gallbladder removal 🙁 ).  I’m taking the kids who will be spending the afternoon with Patsy and her cousins (Logan & Allison).

I hope you’re all having a great week!

The Friesen Family--stylin' in our Texas Trip Tee's!

We’re home (minus Chloe who will be arriving tomorrow night some time) and happy to be in our comfortable environment again.  I think I’m most excited to sleep in our bed with my fabulous pillow again.  🙂  No wait, scratch that–I’m MOST excited to sleep in a different room than Josiah so I don’t wake up every time he moves.  Yes, I’m very excited to get a full night’s sleep.

Everyone was up early to get the vans packed and be on the road just after 7:00.  We sent Chloe back off with the crew and then got ready to head to the airport.  We had to be there mid morning in order to return our car and get through security etc.  Then there was a bit of a scramble when we lost Josiah’s tiger somewhere on our way from the car rental place to the airport… but the driver was nice enough to go back and find it and bring it back to us.  That was definitely a relief!  Our flight landed about 2:30 and I’m happy to report that Josiah slept for almost the entire flight back.  It was GREAT!  He proved to be an awesome traveling toddler on this trip.  Of course, while we were there he was a bit fussy… but he was great on the flights.  I didn’t pull out a single bag-o-distractions on the trip home.

Speaking of Josiah, he was beyond excited to be home–he ran around laughing and playing with his toys for a long time.  It was the most adorable thing.  We played for a while and then I quick mowed our unruly lawn.  It was such a treat to be outside and enjoy the cool evening air.  I tell you, after being in Texas all week with temps stuck solidly at 101* and 102* all week it was a breath of fresh air to walk out of the airport to a low 73*.  We love it.

But now I’m wiped out.  And tomorrow we’re up early again to get to church for worship team (that we were accidentally scheduled for unbeknownst to us…).  But that’s okay because it is our very first Sunday in our new building so we wanted to be a part of the service anyway.  So, I’ll post more later.

All in all the trip was fantastic.  We had a great time relaxing and hanging out with family and doing all sorts of fun things.  I’ll break it down with pictures this week, but here are a few of my favorites from our very first day and our very last day.

Digging into our Bags-O-Distractions on the ride to Texas

The whole happy group--23 total!

Riding on the bus from the car rental to the airport (this was when we didn't know we had lost the tiger)

Proof that he did indeed sleep on the plane ride home. Good thing we found that tiger!

This was the taken the night we all arrived--Chloe was so excited to see us!

It is day 4 of our Texas trip.  I’m sure you’re all dying to know how it’s going! So… I’m going to try and muster through the INCREDIBLY slow internet which is only offered in one room of the resort to write a quick update (individually) for y’all.  Hehe.

Chloe: She left on Thursday morning with the Baker’s and everything went generally well until Friday night.  She was overly tired and homesick and called crying to say she didn’t want to go to Schlitterbahn anymore.  It was heart breaking to hear her crying and not be able to help, but after reassuring her that we would see her the next day she seemed to be better by the time we hung up.  We all arrived at the same time to the resort on Saturday evening and she was visibly thrilled to be reunited with us.  🙂  Since then she’s been her normal self enjoying hanging out with all of her cousins and playing numerous times in the pool here already.  I think her favorite thing since being on the trip is being able to use Tim’s tablet to watch movies and play games… well, that, and eating more junk food than normal.  Hehe…

Josiah: He was amazing on the flight to San Antonio–I only had to dig into one of my “bags-o-distractions.”  The hardest time we had was waiting in the airport. He really wanted to walk around (which was fine) but he didn’t want to hold my hand (which was NOT fine).  We ended up playing on the flat escalators (or “People Movers” as Kristen calls them) for a while, which he thought was a hoot.  On the plane he sat relatively well and didn’t scream or yell at all.  Eventually we had the brilliant idea to lay him flat across our laps and he fell right to sleep.  The only part he didn’t enjoy was landing.  I think the feeling of lowering combined with the loud noise unnerved him.  Since we’ve been here he has been pretty good.  It’s a lot of people and he doesn’t know everyone well, so he’s sometimes fussy (as to be expected). And I didn’t think ahead to bring enough toys for him to play with… but other than that he’s doing great.  And I’m happy to say both kids are sleeping really well at night.

Tim:  He says the trip is going fine.  He’s quite disappointed in the slow/lack of internet but is enjoying catching up with Aunts and Uncles that he doesn’t see very often. Oh, and he’s already killed a small scorpion.

Me: I’m having a great time.  It’s very hot here (102* estimated all week) but our unit has great air conditioning so we’re quite comfortable.  I’ve enjoyed the pool as well and plan to go many more times before we leave.  And the condos are very spacious and nice.  My face is a little sunburned from yesterday’s outing to Shlitterbahn but not too bad.  We’re sharing a condo with Patsy, Jen and Michelle (Tim’s cousin) so the only  kids are ours.  I’ve found a small salamander who seems to be living in our bathroom–we’ve affectionately named it “Sally.”  I’m sleeping terribly… having the kids in the same room combined with the strange bed/pillows are a killer combination for me.  I wake up at every noise the kids make, worried that one kid will wake up the other kid.  And the pillows are too firm or high or something, so it’s giving me an awful kink in my neck that seems to be getting worse by the day.  so, we’re going to swing by a WalMart today and see if we can buy a cheap flatter pillow.  But other than that, the trip is going great.  We enjoyed a great BBQ place on Sunday night here in town and went to Schlitterbahn yesterday (I’ll write more about that later).  We’re heading to San Antonio this afternoon for sightseeing and the river walk and maybe to see the Alamo, then tomorrow we’re heading to Sea World!  So much to do!

I would post pictures, but the internet is too slow to load them right now.

I forgot to post yesterday–whoops!  I spent the morning at our new church building painting and then I we went shopping in the afternoon then an entrance interview and lessons in the evening.  My day just slipped away.  But what am I doing here?  This is supposed to be a WORDLESS post!  😀

Yup we were eating our bowl. Yum....

The kids and I have had a fun couple of days–we decided to run up to see Shannon in St. Cloud yesterday for the afternoon and then today we ran down to Owatonna to see Stacy for the afternoon. Chloe was great both places and Josiah is approaching the age where he is able to be adaptable in different places well. He does have a little work to do yet, but overall he’s getting better. In particular we’ve been working on getting him to SLEEP in his pack and play and not just play in it. And I’m happy to say after working on it for a few days, that he took naps at both houses. Yeah!

But I’m tired, so I’m off to bed. I’ll write more tomorrow. 🙂