Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Taxes

So Roy finally got his first paycheck from Truman. Woo hoo. I cannot believe how much we pay in taxes. We had planned for it of course, but we were a little off on how much we would pay. Ugh. Hey dad, are we going to get a bunch back? I hope so. Stinkin' government! Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go sign up for some free government programs.

Monday, September 29, 2008

All I can be is random....

Rae had her first day of speech today. She goes MWF 8:30-9am. Do you know how hard it is to get everyone out the door by 8:15?? Ugh. Not something we are used to doing! I'm going to try to get something later in the morning, I don't know what I was thinking when I said I could do 8:30. Also, I've been exercising every morning at the school's rec center and I can't do it if we have speech at 8:30. So, I'm going to tough it out a week and then ask if we can make a change.

Rae really enjoyed speech and me and Blaise just hung out in the "lobby" area of the building and read a ton of books and just enjoyed having quiet time with just the two of us. We didn't have much of a breakfast this morning due to lack of time and lack of clean dishes, so after speech we went to Hy-vee, our grocery store here. They have a restaurant inside the store. Living in the mid-west or south is going to be the death of me. Everywhere you go they have delicious biscuits and gravy!!! So, so, so good! We got some biscuits and gravy and eggs,bacon and sausage. They put SO much gravy on your biscuits that you end up having a ton leftover, so I was dipping my eggs and bacon into the gravy! Oh my heck, my cholesterol is going to go up!

As Roy posted, Rae got a haircut on Friday. When we first cut her hair short I wanted her to get bangs, but she really didn't want them. But lately she's been asking for bangs, so we went and got them! They make her hair much more manageable and she can pretty much take care of it herself (on the days we aren't going anywhere super important) She also got her very own hairbrush. I cannot believe how much she is maturing, both in looks and personality! If we were sending her to school she'd be going to kindergarten next year! That is seriously insane!

I hit a squirrel this morning! As far as I know I've never hit one before. I tried so hard to avoid it, but it just went straight under my car! It was so horrible. I looked back and could see it just tossing and flopping around on the ground. I almost wanted to go back and hit it again to put it out of its misery!

This week is Homecoming Week at Truman, so there should be some fun events going on. We've had pretty warm weather lately, but last night there was this huge storm that lasted about 20 minutes and today it's nice and cloudy and cool. Still can't get used to the weather here! Anyway, that's about all going on right now. Hope to hear some updates from some of my siblings! :)

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Bang!

I guess since we got cable, I'll have to take over here.
Rae got bangs.

Thursday, September 25, 2008

We took the plunge...

...and got cable. I'm slightly disappointed in myself, but I'll get over it. :) They had a special 6 month promotion, which is perfect because we won't be here much longer than 6 months. We got a lot of bonus channels, like the BYU channel, and we even got a DVR included! I do believe the DVR will be the death of me. :) And Rae is obsessed already and since we have so many channels there are always cartoons on! But I think we'll all be used to it in a few days and soon we'll be back out at the park and doing more exciting things. :) Blaise is so not into TV, so we can't watch it all day or he gets mad. :) Now I gotta think of something for us to do this afternoon or Rae won't leave the couch. Ugh, and I should probably wake Blaise up from his nap. He'd sleep all afternoon if I let him.

So glad I can set the DVR to record The Office tonight if I don't get home from Enrichment on time. (Which I probably won't, since I would like to actually be sociable!) Can't wait to see what happens with Jim and Pam this season!

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

More eating habits

I made the kids their favorite lunch today: Mac n' Cheese. I made myself some Progresso Southwest Chicken soup (one of those with zero Weight Watchers points) The soup was pretty lame even after adding a little sour cream and cheese and eating it with chips. (kinda cancels out the zero points!) So I was about to throw the last of it away (seriously, it was not good) and I wondered how it would taste with some mac and cheese mixed in. It was delicious! Okay, the secret is out, I have strange tastes! And my somewhat healthy meal was ruined! But very yummy lunch.

I'm off to eat the rest of the mac and cheese (there's always just a tiny bit left at the bottom, not enough to save for another meal!)

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Nummers

Whoever first paired grilled cheese sandwiches with tomato soup was a genius! The way those flavors compliment each other - yum! The sandwiches I made today were especially yummy because they were made with thinly sliced french bread from Walmart (go to your walmart and see if they have sliced french bread, it is so yummy - cooks up crispy on the edges and chewy in the middle!) and I used real butter. So good! It's the only thing that American Cheese is useful for! Someday I'd like to try out a recipe for tomato soup that I saw recently, but for now the canned stuff is fine by me. (doesn't even have to be Campbell's to please me!)

With the rest of the french bread I made garlic bread for our pasta last night. Again, real butter, some garlic powder and dried thyme and oregano. Spread em' out on a cookie sheet and bake them at 350 for a few minutes and then put it on broil for just a minute. Yum yum yum. I am so into buttery things right now! :)

Didn't watch Heroes last night...I was asleep by the time it even came on. I've been going to bed pretty early lately because Blaise hasn't been sleeping very well. And I get up every morning and go to the gym at 6:30, so I need a good night's sleep. I need at least 8 hours of sleep at night and if the kids wake up and I don't get uninterrupted sleep, then I need to be in bed for at least 9 hours to feel like I got enough rest. There will be times in my life where I have a lot to do and only get 6 hours of sleep a night and I'll do just fine for a while but then I get a full night's sleep and realize I could be doing much better! So when things aren't hectic in life I get as much sleep as I can, even though there are always things I could be working on. Sleep is pretty much the last thing I give up.

Anyway, I know I said I'd post pictures, and I still plan to. :) Maybe later today, or after I finally get to watch Heroes tonight!

Monday, September 22, 2008

Stuff and stuff

Heroes tonight! Woot! I probably won't even get to watch it tonight since I don't have cable and I don't know when it'll be online. Oh well, I'm sure I'll catch it sometime this week. And The Office is later this week - woo hoo!

Speaking of cable...the other day Rae asked "when are we going to get one of those tvs that you can change the channel and watch cartoons and shows and stuff?". Yeah, I want one of those "tvs" too! We are thinking about getting cable. The problem is that I don't just watch the shows I enjoy. I sit my bum on the couch and watch whatever is on and waste my evening away. So if I can just break that habit then cable would sure be nice! The kids are really sick of their movies and even the movies from the library. Hey, we should get it now so we have BYU TV and can watch conference at home!

I'm getting Rae started in some speech therapy through the school district. I hope she starts making some improvements soon, because she has started to lose some of the things she learned before the summer. I can understand her most of the time, but sometimes it's like I'm talking to a 2 year old instead of a 4 year old.

I wanted to sign Rae up for tumbling but I decided not to. Since we'll be doing speech at least once a week and preschool twice a week I decided that'd be enough stuff to keep us busy. Also, the class I wanted to sign her up for starts at like 3:30 in the afternoon and sometimes Blaise is still napping at that time. (When he actually takes naps - he's been trying give them up!) Besides, tumbling is like 30 bucks a month, plus shoes and costume expenses. Maybe we'll take the money we save and get cable!! I think I'll just wait till she's old enough to really want to do it and actually gain a lot from it.

The weather here is so weird. Hot one day, cold the next. Rain and rain and rain for days and then days with no rain. I think we might hit the city's indoor pool sometime this week for a little something different to do.

So yeah, there's an update. Totally random, but that's how it gets when I get behind on posting! Pictures to come later today.

Friday, September 19, 2008

Hole in the Wall

If you want a good laugh check out Fox's "Hole in the Wall". (again, it's a fox on demand show, which is why we watch it) Rae really likes to watch it and then try to imitate the shapes they need to make to get through the hole. I'd like to be on this show! Good stuff. We used to watch the Japanese version.

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Fringe again

It is pretty gory.

Fringe, cleaning and Violette

Have you heard of the new Fox show called "Fringe"? You can watch it on Fox on Demand (we don't have cable, so we only watch shows you can watch online!) For those of you who thought Heroes was too violent and gory, this one is a little less of both (well, so far) We watched the first episode on Saturday night and the second episode aired last night, so I think we have a date to watch it tonight.

This morning when I came in from sleeping outside I realized our house really stunk! Every week or so I walk into the house from running an errand or something, and realize it stinks. Usually it's just the trash can or something, but this morning it seemed like everything was so behind on being cleaned! Roy took out the trash and that helped the smell and I've spent the rest of the morning catching up on everything else. Sometimes it nice to get a little behind because it feels so good to get caught up! Roy took the van to school this morning, so I'm forced to stay home and deal with the chores here. The kids are being reasonable and actually playing nicely together, so it's been a nice morning so far!

Violette is adjusting nicely to our family. I let Rae hold her yesterday during Blaise's nap and they did just fine together. She doesn't jump every single time we walk past and she's getting used to the loud kids. Whenever we get her out to pet her we offer her some sort of fresh fruit or veggie. She usually won't take it directly from us, so we put it in her cage when we put her back in, so now she associates being held with getting yummy food. She did eat hay from Roy's hands this morning. We went to the pet store in town to see what sort of supplies they have (NONE!) and they had some full grown guinea pigs - yikes, I didn't realize how big they got! She might need a bigger cage eventually. Actually, we'd like to have two guinea pigs someday, but probably not till we get settled somewhere permanently.


A close up of Violette


We had a birthday cake for Violette (hey, any excuse to eat cake, right?) Yum, candy corn! The best part of Halloween! (and those peanut butter "mary janes")


Another campout

We slept out in the tent again last night. This time Blaise joined us. Why the heck does anyone camp? We settled down for the night around 8 or so and Rae fell asleep pretty easily by 8:30, but Blaise was awake for a long time - probably till about 9. He's not used to having to block out noises and light so he had a harder time falling asleep. Plus, he took a long nap late in the afternoon. Roy had to stay up and write a test for his class tomorrow and it ended up taking him till 2 in the morning! He came out at 2 and got Rae to go potty. After that I couldn't get back to sleep for another hour or so and then Blaise woke up and realized he was outside and wanted to cuddle with me, so I spent the rest of the morning with his head on my shoulder. It got pretty darn cold last night, so I also kept waking up to make sure the kids were covered and that they weren't pressed up against the sides because there was a lot of moisture on the tent and it would get you wet if you pressed against the sides.

Sigh, what a night. Blaise woke up at 6:30 and I took him in the house and woke Roy up and then went back outside to be with Rae. Luckily she slept till 7:45, so I got a little more sleep. Poor Roy is going to be exhausted today, and Blaise is already showing signs of lack of sleep. My back and shoulders hurt and to top it all off we are all getting colds. Fun stuff. Moral of the story is: if things go well the first time, don't do them again!

Monday, September 15, 2008

Happy Birthday MOM!

I don't know if you'll get a chance to check this today, but I hope you have a great day and get a little relaxation. Love you!

Saturday, September 13, 2008

New pet!

We've been talking for a while about getting a pet for Rae. We were considering a frog but they are pretty boring. We thought some easy fish, but those are boring too. We went to Columbia yesterday and hit up Petco. The first animal we wanted to consider was a ferret! Turns out they cost like 130 bucks and their cages cost another 130! And they are a lot more maintenance than I'm ready for right now. But Roy has always wanted a ferret, so it's something we'll consider in the future.

We spent SO long at Petco trying to decide. The kids were super hyper from chocolate shakes and it was after 7, so they were fighting off sleepiness too. We looked at frogs, fish, hamsters, mice, etc,etc and finally decided on a guinea pig! Well, we decided that if we were going to get a pet we would get a guinea pig, but we hadn't decided whether we were ready for the start-up cost involved. But we decided just about every pet is going to involve some start-up cost, so if we wanted a pet we might as well do it now. The kids are at a good age for a new pet and life is pretty calm and easy right now. And guinea pigs are supposed to be super friendly and easy to take care of.

So, introducing....Violette: (named after the building where Roy works, and purple!)




Not very good pictures, but she's pretty scared and timid right now, so it's gonna take some getting used to before she comes out for a photo-shoot :) She's only a few weeks old. Last night she let me hold her quite a bit, but this morning she's super jumpy and doesn't want anything to do with me. We'll give her some alone time in a while when we go to the store, so hopefully she'll be able to relax a bit.

Anyway, pretty big excitement in the Wright home! Guinea pigs can live like 4-8 years, so this may be a really long commitment. I'm already worried about finding someone to watch her during Christmas break, but as long as I start looking early I'm sure I'll be able to find someone.

Friday, September 12, 2008

McDonalds and Redbox

On Tuesdays our McDonalds has Happy Meals for $1.50. With every Happy Meal you buy you get a code for a free movie from Redbox. Woot woot! We've done Tuesdays at McDonald's twice now and last time there was this old guy there that was getting Happy Meals and he gave us his toys and codes. (Nothing like a playroom full of junky toys!)

I love Redbox. We have 4 of them here in Kirksville, so you can almost always find the movie you want. And I hardly ever have to pay for them! I also get a text every Monday with a free code. If you haven't tried it yet, give it a shot! They also have some good kid movies. The only problem is having to return them the next day, which isn't convenient if you don't plan on being out. But ours are so close that it's worth it. Our other movie-renting option is a place called "Movie Gallery" which is like Blockbuster but cheaper. You can rent new releases there for 2 bucks for a one night rental (it's like 4 bucks for a week rental) and they have a big selection of kid movies that are only a buck for a week rental! I like the options like Netflix and Blockbuster, and have used both, but I always felt like I HAD to watch movies to make it worth my money. Now, when we have a holiday break we can watch a bunch of movies and when we are busy we can just watch one or two.

I watched Baby Mama the other day. Good stuff if you have nothing better to do!

Saturday, September 06, 2008

Lame-o

I can't believe I didn't post anything for a whole week! I'm so fail.

Not much going on lately. We had a lot of rain this week. I went to the gym several times. Me and the kids went to Columbia for some "big city" action. Fun stuff.

Sometimes I get in a blogging rut. I'm sure I'll come out of it in a couple of days and get back to business! I've got some pictures from our lake trip last week, so I'll try to post those soon. Until then - umm....stay tuned. :)

Saturday, August 30, 2008

Houseflipping?

We've got our eye on a nice little property down the street from us:

Link!

...or maybe we'll just move in ourselves!
We just finished off the last of my homemade pancake mix and the kids loved them! Time for a new batch - this time with a little more whole wheat flour and a little less white flour.

I finally made it to the rec center yesterday! It was great! There's so much to do there. As Roy's "designated guest" I only get to go between 6:30am-2pm. So, I pretty much have to go as soon as it opens or there won't be time for Roy to get to school on time. I can't believe I have access to all this stuff for free! I'm trying to make it part of my routine so that when it's cold and dark outside I still get up and go. On Saturdays I can use it anytime of day, so I plan to have nice long workout today, and hopefully every Saturday. I should ride my bike to the school, but then I might be too tired to do anything else!

Friday, August 29, 2008

WOWZA!

I missed the two-year anniversary of starting my blog!! I did my first post on August 13, 2006! You see, I was "hip" before blogs were so popular. :) I think my friend "Bluebell" over at Degenerate Subspace was the one who made me really want to start a blog. Hers is very honest and fun to read. And I like that it's changed tones over time to reflect things that have gone on in her life - proof that she's not trying to please any audience. Her early posts always made me crack up and feel relieved that I wasn't the only one who thought that way (but I'm usually too afraid to admit!) Some of favorite posts: Santa Rant
and Moo

Anyway, Happy Birthday/Anniversary/Whatever to me! Thanks for reading!

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Randomness (edited to include pictures) Updated: "After the storm"

I'm officially a Missourian. I got my driver's license on Tuesday. Whoop whoop! I went today and registered our van. (We had to get it inspected first, which ended up costing a bunch of money because there were a few things to fix - ergh!)
I love the "DMV" here. It's just a little tiny office with 3 or 4 employees and they are all super nice. And the two times I went there were only a few other customers. Way better than in CA!

Our oven doesn't cook very evenly. I burned some muffins the other day, my oatmeal cookies didn't cook right today and I just took some rolls out of the oven and the bottoms almost burnt!! Ergh! I never burn things! Seriously - I hardly even leave the kitchen when something is baking because I'm constantly checking it!

Our kitchen has such little counter space that we are forced to do the dishes constantly or we won't even have room to butter a slice of bread. Seriously, no counter space, especially since there's only one drawer in the kitchen, so all of our knives and spatulas are in little "carousels" on the counter top. My BIL Chad would have a heart attack if he came into our kitchen since the counter tops are so covered! (He's got all the counter space in the world, yet he insists on putting the paper towels in the pantry!) :) Good news is: the dishes are ALWAYS done!

Butter and margarine are sold in long skinny bars here. In CA they were a little shorter and thicker. Weird.

Check out the size of the praying mantis we found! We actually found three this size. Creepy!



Went to a thrift store the other day and I got a really cute pair of pjs for myself, a Halloween vest for Rae and a Tigger costume - all for $1.25. Awesome.

The other day Roy was being neglectful in the morning, so Rae got out leftover eggs (green eggs to be exact) and two plates from the dishwasher and served up breakfast! She's been super helpful lately. She gets herself dressed for bed every night and even gets out PJs for Blaise! Notice the fly on the table. We have a lot of flies here. Gross.



Rae can't decide what to be for Halloween. She wanted to be a little old lady, and then she got that tigger costume, which is cute, but not super exciting. She wants Blaise to be a cat. Weird that Blaise doesn't even know what Halloween is! I know he'll LOVE it though!

We've had some nice cool weather lately, but it was pretty warm today, I even considered going to the pool but we just didn't have enough time. We picked Roy up from school at about 4:45 and it was hot and sunny. I wish I had more of a notice of rain..check it out... by 5:45 it looked like this:



After the wind settled down a little we let the kids go out and play in the sandbox, which was now a pool!






Okay, here is a picture from 7:30 tonight...the storm is completely over and it looks as if nothing ever happened!



Yup, total randomness. I've been meaning to blog about most of these things for a few days now, so here it is - all in one post!

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Good ol' Blythe

I grew up in Blythe,CA (in case anyone out there didn't know) My friend sent me a link to a video from "pvtv" with my daddy in it! My dad is the principal at the high school there - and his name is Jeppson, not Jessop.

A few things I must point out:

-How unprofessional does that "news anchor" look?? Nice tattoo.

-The football stadium took a really long time to remodel (I dunno how long - but something like 4 years!) and it look exactly the same! :) Okay, it does look nice, but not that much different.

-All the other principals had a few short sentences to say, but my dad had a whole speech prepared! I think he's probably the only principal that has anything prepared for the school year as well.

-The last principal they showed - Jeremy James - was a teacher at the HS when I was there and I had a huge crush on him.

-How pathetic is our band?! Some things never change.