5 days until the movers arrive

5 days until the movers knock on the door. First my e-mail has changed. It is now pam.petrie@us.army.mil Today I said good bye to the little girl I babysitt. I kept her big sister from the first day her mom went back to work until the day before my water broke with Grace. Now I have had the pleasure of keeping her baby sister. I love these girls but for some reason this little girl has really touched my heart. Why is it so much harder to say good bye to kids. I guess because I know a year from now she will not remember me. I love the way when she sees my kids she gets excited and yells there name. On Monday at 1pm the housing office does a pre inspection to tell us wha else we need to do to clean housing. Then at 2pm the movers come to do a walk through to decide how many movers will come and what size boxes they come. Have I told you they even put our mattreses in boxes. Yesturday we hit the house hard. Rob and I spent probably 6 hours cleaning the kitchen. I need to finish doing dishes. No I did not have 6 hours of dishes but someone (no one is admitting it) turned the hot water heater down for the thousand fifth time. So I had no hot water. We got the inside of the windows cleaned, the floors done, moved furniture and cleaned under it, took everything off the walls and rob put a fresh coat of stain on the table. Went through the cabinets and organized them and got rid of anything that was open we knew we would not use. We poured the rock salt on the sidewalk because it was ice raining. I do not know if it worked but the side walk was not slick. We even took the computer apart and packed up our Bob Jones hard drive.
I cleaned up and re organized all the school books in the livingroom. Re straighted up the livingroom a hundred times, took Christmas pictures off the wall. It you send me a Christmas picture it is likely that it has hung on my wall for the last year, I love looking at them. Rob vacummed under the furniture. I got all the laundry folded and put away (except hanging stuff). I want to finish up laundry today and take our laundry sorter apart.
I cleaned up my room. Put away all my laundry, went through my dresser and pulled out 2 trash bags of stuff. I even decided to get rid of my nursing bras. The only thing left today is for Rob needs to clean off his dressers. Yes, he has 2 dressers and I have one. The kids got there rooms cleaned even under the beds.
Rob spent 6 hours cleaning out the garage on Thursday.
Today my goal is to clean my bathroom, you know like organize the hairbows and bandaids. Rob is going to work on really cleaning bathrooms and the office. I also want to go through the girls pajama drawers. I do not know why we have 4 pajama drawers when they wear daddy shirts 99% of the time. Okay I guess I better get to work if I want to be done.

5 Question Friday

1. Would you ever vacation alone? it is great to vacation with my family and i would love it but yes i would take a short vacation by myself in a heart beat. how about a cruise with my NEW sewing machine, stamping stuff and scrapbooking stuff


2. Do you go the speed limit?ummmmmmmmmmm off post always but i swear on post it seems like i am always speeding


3. Why did you start blogging/following blogs? because my husband deploys alot and i wanted to have a place for him to come and see a glimpse into our life, for family who is not close. but now i do it because i love it and because it is fun and i love all the new people i have met


4. Where do you shop for yourself? scrapbook stores, pampered chef, catos


5. What was the song that you danced your first dance with your spouse to at your wedding...or...what song would you like your first dance to be to?we did not dance, we had no electricity. i should really blog about this one day. a slow song for sure

Wonderful friends

Monday night my friends from my home school group had a going away party for me. They collected the money and gave me money to buy a sewing machine. I was so excited. My friend Kristi went with me to pick the perfect sewing machine and the extra things I needed. I went to her house on Thursday evening and she taught me the basics on the machine and by the time we were done I had made my first skirt. I have made 5 since then. The apron and mug are from my wonderful friend Janet that I have written before. I love the apron. It says Excalibur Bakery because I like to take breakfast to the moms at our co-op. The framed art work is from my friend Melinda. She makes some of the coolest things. Going to her house is so relaxing, it is almost like you are in a country store, so relaxing. I could set here and write for days about this group of ladies but right now it is just too hard. I do want to take a moment and say thank you to each of them who has helped me through the last 5.5 years. I have made some wonderful friends. I will never be able to do enough to re pay them for all they have done for me. The black and white skirts are the ones I made with my new machine.

new things on my blog

There is a blog I have been reading for months and would love you to visit. Besides the prize that is being offered for using mr.linky I love this blog. I love reading about there adoption stories. Aout how much faith they have in God. I love reading his magazine and his tutorials. I also installed a new comment section. This allows my viewers (friends) to talk to one another and me to comment back to you. I have been trying for weeks to install it and was not doing something right. I think I finally have it right.


There’s a great new “linky” service available and I wanted to let you know about it. It’s called MckLinky – www.mcklinky.com. After realizing the need for a new, reliable linky capability, Brent Riggs and MckMama got together to create a free, easy to use linky service for all their blog friends.
MckLinky is a free link list feature that allows you to do include lists of other blog links like MckMama does on Not Me! Monday. You can use MckLinky any time you want your blog readers to leave a list of links on your blog. It’s simple, reliable, free...and loads of MckFun!

Sci Quest

One of the fun places to visit if you live near us is Sci-Quest/. They have amazing classes for kids and even have a parents date night that sounds fun. I love to go during a school day just to let the kids run around. there is a big house in the middle that is great for Grace's age. They can plant veggies and flowers, cook food, play musical instruments. We had not been in a couple of years so I took the girls one last time before the move. My friend Constance and Ranny both went so the kids had lots of friends to play with. This was a pool game on the wall and you were suppose to jump to hit the balls. When Faith could not reach the balls she put Grace on her shoulders to help.

Wordless Wednesday

home made poptarts

I just love the name of it. Jump over and find some new fun recipes. I caved and bought pre made pie shells at Christmas. Then I did not have the guts to use them so they just set in the fridge staring at me. Since we are moving I decided they needed to be used. A friend was talking about toaster strudels. So I made some.
Ingredients
pie shells
strawberry jam or any other flavor you like
1. roll out dough and cut into squares
2. i put my dough on parchment paper and then put jam on top of pasty, layered with another pastry
3. bake 350 for 10-12 minutes
4. i took them off the parchment paper as soon as they come out of the oven so that the jam that had come out of the sides would not have time to harden
5. I did add a powder sugar icing to the top
These turned out better than I thought. I can not wait to get moved and re try them and try to freeze them

Pamela

Not Me Monday-moving edition

I think I will say this is not me Monday moving edition. I think this not me should be about the move. I am not going to have to throw away 20 ounces of breast milk from 4 years ago because it has been setting in my freezer for 4 years. I am not that emotional that i would keep these last few bags of milk instead of throwing it out years ago.
When cleaning out my dresser drawers I did not have to sneak and throw away ten four negative pregnancy test because I hide them in there so dear husband does not know I take them. I would never take test every month when I know DH thinks it is a waste of money and I really agree with him.
My daughter did not have a BM in a bowling alley and then refuse to go at home, not Grace she would never be 4 years old and still need pull ups.
My son who is addicted to computers and has been grounded from them for at least 9 months did not take a laptop with a broken screen and hook it up to a monitor in the office to get on line. My child would never be that determined.
I did not stay out until well after midnight twice this week.
My DH did not buy Pepsi one because it was on sale and then realize it was not as good as diet Pepsi and go back and buy diet Pepsi. He also did not drink 6 12 packs of diet Pepsi in one week.
My DD did not once twice but three time dry my new shirts and skirt this week after being reminded a million times.
This week when I was going to a going away party I most certainly could find all of my make up and would NEVER have to go buy new mascara because i could not find mine. I always wear make up and fix my hair.
This week I did not have a dream about being treated like trash by other officers wives and then dream about a baby moose coming into my house and not knowing what to do.
This week I am not going to call housing to fix a faucet in the kitchen or to tell them that my bathroom leaks when it rains hard, of course I would not wait until the week before we move to have them do repairs. I am not totally hoping they replace the whole faucet in the kitchen and light in the bathroom so I do not have to clean them.
I did not announce at my going away party that at my next post I want to be quiet and known as a quiet person because I am so loud now. Of course I am a quiet women and would never be a loud mouth.
Speaking of mouth, I have not bit holes into my lip and mouth. I would never do this day in and day out.

Mama guilt

I have started reading a new blog. The name is cop mama and on Mondays she does mama guilt.
This week I am having lots of mama guilt. For years my 9 year old has wanted to learn to sew. When I was in the hospital my MIL taught her some basics. I could not thread a needle. Last week the ladies of my homeschool group bought me a sewing machine and I have already spent one night at a friends house learning to use it and made 3 skirts. Everyday Faith says can you teach me to sew and every day I say not until after we move. I should so teach her to sew.

5 question Friday

1. What is better, growing old with out money or dying young and wealthy? To me I can not wait to see my kids have babies and play with them. although I wish they would stay little forever

2. Who takes out the garbage at your house?
my son, every morning before breakfast

3. Have you ever had the same dream many times?
yes, i dream of delivering babies at least once a week and when DH is deployed I have lots of nightmares

4. Can you play a musical instrument?
not now, I have played flute and cello but can not read music

5. If you owned your own store, what would you sell?
I would love to own a bakery and have my husband work with me. we work well together and I love to bake. I am not great at it but I love doing it

Dr. Mahesh

Dr. Mahesh has treated Will and Grace since birth. This is the only doctor we have had since birth that I have totally trusted. I know that I can call him day or night and someone will be there to help me. I will never forget one of the first funny things he said to me. When our babies were young we would be taken to our rooms and then Will's mom and I would stand in the hallway and talk. He told us we were desperate synagis moms (kinda like desperate housewives) because we could not wait to talk. Within a couple of months they let us just put our babies in the same room and so for the last 4 years we have been seen together every time we go in. When Grace was put in the hospital at a year old for lack of growth he pitched a fit that I did not call him to have him admit her. See because the military saw us we saw any doctor available and he could have changed that. When Grace got sick last year we knew she was really sick when I asked her if she wanted to go see Dr. Mahesh and she said no. We knew then she was out of it. Dr. Mahesh takes his time with us, answers the same questions I have asked before. He talks to us like we are friends and as if he is a family friend treating Grace. If you look at the pictures you will notice he is always in blue jeans and a t shirt. Dr. Mahesh has always been patient when I brought in my other children and even laughed with them and taught my son who does not watch football that Auburn is bad. I love living here and there are lots of things that makes me not want to move but one of the major reasons is for Dr. Mahesh and his nurses.
Please know that his nurses are as important to me as he is. They laugh with us. They always have time to talk to me and laugh with me. They always return phone calls quickly. They have never made us feel like we are bothering them. They are always smiling. There is another lady I want to say Thank you to, Mrs. Dorthy. Mrs. Dorthy works the front desk and answers the phone when I call. She has always smiled at us and given us anything we need. I have never called and her forget to leave a message for the right person. When I call for the tenth time because I can not remember what time my appointment is she tells me. When Grace was in the hospital last year I was given a special treat. I walked past the nurses station (we did laps up and down the hall) twice thinking I know that lady. It was Mrs. Dorthy. She was working the nurses desk. Here are some older pictures of Dr. Mahesh and the kids.

Faith

This child would love for you to take her picture all day. She tries so hard to wear heels and make up.

Grace

Loves having her picture taken and I love her smile so it works out great.