Zoom! Updates Galore! (with photos, you know you like photos)

It's been awhile! I've been so busy, I hardly know where to start, so let's just revert to bullet-style, shall we? Hrm?

Oh, good, I love when we agree!

Thing 1: My poor, poison-ivy covered SIL Jen came over this weekend with the kids. They stayed over Sat-Sun, b/c my BIL is away for his two-weeks-a-year (but really they invade his life every, single, effing day). Since Sun was a family gathering at Kathy's (the other SIL, which I'll get to in a minute), who lives closer to me, rather than driving here and back on Sat, and there and back on Sun, they all stayed here and we had a blast (other than her itching). We went to the bead company store for her belated birthday gift and made jewelry in the morning, and then went strawberry picking in the afternoon with all the kids. That night we played Raving Rabbids TV Party on Wii (if you haven't played it, and you have a Wii, you MUST GET IT, because you will pee your pants laughing) until after midnight.

Thing 2: The gathering at my SIL Kathy's house was, as expected, totally unpleasant. I literally can't eat when I'm there, so I didn't have dinner at all (we always just do a cookout potluck buffet thing when we're there, so it wasn't like we were inside at a table and it was glaringly obvious that I didn't eat anything). I ended up holding one of the twin babies most of the time I was there because she was being fussy. I still don't feel terribly connected to them, but I'm trying. I am definitely not emotionally over the email freak-out they did on me, and also I saw what is now the babies' room for the first time. It used to be Ryan's room, and this is the first time I haven't been able to go in there and just sit amongst his stuff and mentally talk to him. He was cremated, so there's no cemetary or headstone or bench to go to, and now that his room is finally changed, it was almost like losing him all over again, which was hard, to say the least. Between that and feeling like you could cut the tension between my BIL and I with a knife, I was near vomiting the entire time. DH said that he really never wants to go there again, because it's so filthy and because it makes me so unhappy, but I don't see how we'd get out of it. If the family is gathering there, we'll just have to make the best of it.

Thing 3: I threw caution to the wind and bought a new couch!

It looks a lot like this one, except instead of
the loveseat on the right, it has three full seats. The back of both middle seats (right and left sides) fold down to make a table, and four of the seats recline. It is SO COMFY!!! It'll be here on the 26th, and I'm so excited!

I have to admit to a little bit of buyer's remorse in that it was expensive, and we could have used the money to pay towards some credit cards, but our current couch is eight years old, and isn't really comfy anymore, while the oversized sleeper-chair that is next to it has almost totally fallen apart, even though it's only about five years old. Plus, we only have seating for four or five at the moment in the living room, depending on how cozy you want to be, and that's not really good for when you have company. We may actually take the corner piece of the sectional and set it in the corner of the room, and use the other two pieces as separate couches since there are arms on both sides of each piece. It was the same price to get both couches alone as it was to get the group, so we got it, and we'll see what happens. If we use it as a corner piece, we won't use our end tables anymore, and I kind of like them, so we'll see what happens.

Thing 4: Patrick is SO grounded. He left the house yesterday AGAIN without telling me!!!! He trotted on down the street with a much older boy who had stopped by out of boredom, when I thought they were out on the front porch! I had a HEART ATTACK. I was literally out in the street calling for him at the top of my lungs, hoping he was still within shouting distance, trying not to freak out. Luckily, he had 'only' gone as far as my friend Megan's house, about seven houses away, so he did finally hear me and come running. I burst into tears, and then he did, too, which I thought was slightly redeeming until I realized it was because he was afraid that he was going to get grounded (well, duh). So, he spent the rest of the afternoon and evening in his bed, until about 9pm, when DH let him get up to say hello to a couple members of the touring Kantorei Boy's Choir, who were staying with us last night after a performance at our church. Other than that, there will be no friends and no computer useage until he goes to camp on Monday.

Thing 5: I've been appointed the vice-chair of the worship committee at church. This is sort of a big deal, since that committee is really an assembly of all the committee heads in the building, like the people in charge of children's activities, music programming, holiday activities, decoration, finance, etc). It'll be an interesting way to learn about the workings of the structure of the church. The chair is an elder, and when he's ready to leave, I assume I'll be chair if I want to be. We also get to appoint people to positions, and if we don't like how a committee is being run, theoretically we could replace them, although I can't imagine doing such a thing since I know all the people. So, now I'm vp of the pta, and of this, too. Huh. Maybe I should run for office, while I'm at it.

Thing 6: I finally started wallpapering the dining room, and it looks awesome!!!! There will eventually be a chair rail around the bottom, which I'll probably paint cream.





















Thing 7: Over at Literally Booked, another author stopped by!! This time it was Lisa Genova, author of Still Alice, which I loved. She said the nicest things about my review, and I was so flattered!! It's really hard for me not to go all Sally Field when someone like that makes nice comments on there, because they like me, they really like me!

Thing 8: Josie's piano teacher told her this afternoon that she has a rare gift and will make a truly talented musician. It was hard not to run over and kiss him, but I restrained myself. :)

I think that's it. See? Lots. Aren't you glad it was in easily-skimmed bullet format? I knew you would be. You're welcome!