Year 2, Day 167: Recovery Day

Normally, the day after an errand day, which was yesterday, is a slower, stay at home recovery day.  But, today was worse than other days because two night ago, I couldn't sleep.  Too much caffeine, too late in the day, too much B6 vitamin taken too late in the day, too much anxiety over scattered to do lists, too little money for normal life and projects, too much, period.  So, what did I do at 3 am that night/morning?  Filled out the quarterly taxes so I wouldn't get busy the next day and forget.  They needed to be postmarked today.  I thought yesterday I would be exhausted by the afternoon, but only armed with my normal caffeine and the B6 taken after breakfast as it should be, I just kept going.  Skip forward to today and I could barely make it out of bed after Mr. Crazy Snuggler brought his whole bedful of stuff with him at 7 am.  Most of the time, Abishai is too wiggly to snuggle well, and he was extra wiggly this morning.  I can't snooze because he's usually on the outside of the bed, with me in the middle and Jared on the other side and after having him fall off the bed at least a dozen times, I'm paranoid he'll do it again.  He's like a cat or dog that makes circles in the same 12 inches before settling down, except he rarely settles down.  Anyway, it was a rough wake up.

Combine that with a slow moving teenager who is trying to earn money for his school tuition next year (it will be matched dollar for dollar), and it's a disaster.  Slow, pain filled momma plus toddler plus teenager (who throws toddler fits) makes for a day filled with texts to the head of the household.  Some days are great and smooth and other days, wow, it's rough.  But we all managed to get through the day and it ended very well.  Benaiah worked for 3 out of his 4 required hours, Justin did his chores, played Legos, read and entertained Abishai, and Abishai played tornado all day, pulling toys out, getting into the fridge, playing outside in his water table, etc.  I managed to do a final organization of my desk which reduces my anxiety.  Now important papers have a place and I can locate everything quickly.  I can find office supplies when needed as well.  Tonight I will make a must do list for tomorrow, a "put off until next week" list, and so forth. I have new folders for "talk to Jared about" and "needs payment" and the papers for the above to d lists, which is a first for me.  I'm so glad I took the time to organize other papers before we moved.  It feels great to be organized!

Jared had to paint a couple more spots at the condo, so we all went with him to do a final run through and say good-bye.  I don't have nearly as much emotional angst this time since it was for only 1 year.  But Justin wanted me to take pictures of everything and kept saying it was sad to leave.  Abishai kept running around saying, "Sissy's bed bye-bye, bubby's bed bye-bye, Mommy's bed bye-bye."  He just stated the facts.  We did run into our neighbor Judy and gave her some extra hugs.  Abishai even hugged her twice and when she rolled down her car window to say good-bye, she blew him a kiss and he responded with his own blown kiss!  Heart melter!

We only went to Meijer for the things we had coupons for, which were store brand basics like milk and eggs!  Woot! Woot!  We didn't stay long with the fishes, but Abishai did have fun looking at the "roars" aka lobsters.  He also walked all the way to the back of the store and most of the way back to the front.  And he didn't wander off too much.  Yeah!

An early birthday present from Leah: new cute cubes to go in our one and only cube shelf! It would be nice to get some new shelves, too, but I think I'm going to use these for my grown up crafts like cross stitch stuff and get it out of those brown boxes.

We finally went to the storage barn and got our microwave.  It still works!  Although some of the lights for the numbers no longer work.  But I had to rig it using a power strip because we only have the one working power outlet and it has a 3 prong power cord and all our extension cords are two prong.  #homeownerproblems

So, I moved the toaster oven over to the other side of the kitchen, but can't plug it in there because that outlet doesn't work.  I plug the coffee maker into an outlet on the other side of the kitchen to make coffee, but then immediately move it back. 

I know Justin loves this desk space to build, but he gets super frustrated when Abishai touches his Jurassic World set.  I can't wait to put up shelves all around the room so the boys can display all their sets and creations, as well as the boxes they have saved.

Mommy hack!  When the toddler has a sore bum from eating too much fruit and you can't get to him when he gets into the fridge fast enough to stop him from eating more fruit, you lock the fridge!

Finally, a workable desk space again!  No more paper clutter!

Our 50 foot Norway Pine tree!  How do we know it's 50 ft?  See below!

Do you see that white shirt up there?  Jared climbed to 35 feet and had his extra long, professional roll along the ground tape measure.

How's the wifi up there?  I ask because I walked the whole perimeter of our yard today and had almost full strength everywhere I went.  That's why you pay for the highest interest capability and don't spend it on a house phone or cable TV.  We can watch movies on YouTube at the neighbor's fence or check email on our way down the driveway to get snail mail.

Abishai kept wanting to get in the baby stroller, so I encouraged him to put the doll in instead.

We also got out the pretend food  and doll stuff.  When it was time for Abishai to go to bed, he got baby ready for bed, too.

Benaiah had lots of yardwork to do today.  He spent 2 1/2 hrs on cleaning out gutter's downspouts and cutting up wooden beams for campfires.

With all the games out and on his level, Abishai is having a blast trying them out!  Including using these pieces from a beat up game of Trouble.  Abishai can get into any game that is missing a few pieces, but we are much more careful with the fullly stocked ones.

Good bye Miss Judy!

Ready, set, go!  Abishai kept saying, "Empty, empty!"

We had parked near the condo's garage, so Benaiah moved the van to a parking spot when were done.  Yeah!

Very nice!

Good bye everything!

Last porch picture!  Compare that to first ones we took last year!  Big difference!

A toddler in a man's body.

I told him to get out of the way of the picture and Benaiah rolled across the floor instead.

Justin's sad face.

Good-bye condo #7!

Last pictures.

Quiet, and locked, front entrance.

Quiet neighborhood, with a great park nearby.

Benaiah and Jared also pulled the great big weeds out of the flowerbed.  Next, we'll either rake all the old mulch and weed barrier out or till it down into the ground.  I know exactly what I want to plant in that are spot, the irises that I had gotten from Leah and put in the Beech Grove flower beds.

Looking much better!

Climbing a tree, just because he can, to see how tall it is.  It doesn't surprise me.

Where did Daddy go?

Best picture of Abishai I've taken in weeks!  That's a perfect expression of his personality 95% of the time!

Fearless!  He wasn't even scared to be up there like all the other kids would have been.  There's lots of different kinds of trees in our yard and you can climb some of them.

Looking a bit sleepy, as am I.  Good night!