6.years.old

...already.

Happy Birthday Claire!

At 6 years old, Claire has completed her first year of kindergarten, learned how to read, and learned how to ride her bike without training wheels. She caught onto that bike thing really fast, too....I was shocked!

Favorites (just for today, of course)...

book: Stinky Clothes and Abby's Asthma and the Big Race

show: Clifford

color: light blue/light yellow

food: chicken nuggets

thing about Mom: you're my teacher (thank goodness she likes this!)

thing about Dad: wrestling

thing about Meredith: she gave me sunglasses

thing about Amelia: I get to hold her

toy: new duck (that she bought with her birthday $$)

If you could change your name, what would you change it to? Sally.

What do you want to be when you grow up? Astronaut.

What are you excited about for this summer? Swimming.

From Claire: I love my new wallet that Aunt Jill gave me for my birthday. I can't wait to go birthday shopping. I can't wait to have mom make me a strawberry cake for my birthday!!

Claire is such a great kid! She was such an unexpected surprise when she came, but we just can't imagine our lives without her. She is a natural leader in her world. She's extremely athletic, competitive, and great at math. As of now, she isn't a lover of reading, but she does love to be read to. She also enjoys writing, drawing, and coloring.

Claire, we're so blessed to have you in our lives, and our family just wouldn't be the same without you! We love you so much. Happy 6th birthday, sweet girl.

busy.busy.busy

Goodness, we've been busy. Here's what we've been up to:

I had poison ivy and finally went to the doctor at the end of last week after it was beginning to spread to areas that it just shouldn't spread. Sweet relief.

We celebrated Claire and Josh's birthdays at the lake over the weekend (even though neither of them have hit their big days yet).

We had our last day of kindergarten last Friday...yay!

We hit the zoo for the first time of the year last Wednesday!

And today, I'm remembering what I was doing exactly 6 years ago....I taught my last day of 5th grade, went to my last doctor's appointment, was told that I was barely dilated, and had dinner with Josh and my parents. I woke up the next morning at 5:45 to my water breaking at the same time as the alarm was ringing. It was a bit of a rude (yet exciting!) awakening.

And the rest (as they say) is history.

airline.update

So, I talked with supervisor Beth yesterday about my bag. I had called earlier in the week but hadn't heard back....frustrating, yes.

She said, "Didn't Rachel call you back?" Ummmm....no. (I really wasn't surprised as I'm sure Rachel was tired of being the bearer of bad news.)

She proceeds to tell me that they have decided to split the difference with me on the bag that I purchased (from Marshall's) for $49. The bag was "originally" $160, priced at Marshall's for $79 and on clearance for $49. It was a really nice bag.

So, they were going to give me $24 for my bag. I informed her that I appreciated her working with me, but I still could not purchase a new bag (even a cheap one) for $24. This is now becoming a matter of principle. ...do unto others, you know?

I asked her what she would expect if someone damaged her bag...to which she replied that she understood my frustration. I informed her that I run my own business and when we have issues arise with our clients, we fess up and make things right with them. I don't feel like I am being unreasonable here.

"Oh, and didn't Rachel offer you a travel voucher? We are definitely willing to offer that to you." Ummmm...I don't think I'll be traveling with (named airline) again. This has been WAY too much of a hassle.

I told her that even though my bag wasn't that expensive and that it may have depreciated to the value of less than $9 in their eyes (they felt like they were being generous with their $9), that I still had to replace my bag that was in perfectly good condition when I dropped it off. Not only that, I was planning to use this bag for several years to come!

I cannot replace my bag even for $24, and I would simply like an amount that would replace my bag with a bag of equal quality. (The cheapest bag that I have seen to replace my old bag was $30.) I told her that I felt like I was being as honest as I could, and I could have lied to her and told her I had a Samsonite bag that I paid $160 for 2 years ago.

So (after I'm guessing she decided that I wasn't going to let it go), she finally offered to take it to a higher authority.

Thank you, yes, I would appreciate that very much. And the saga continues next week...

felt.food

I know a little girl who is turning 6 next week and just might get a little felt food for her birthday! (We'll see how much time I have for a top-secret project!!) Isn't this stuff adorable? See more at homemade by jill.

This post is just for Jess!

a.good.laugh

So just this morning, I stumbled across a blog called Cake Wreck (when professional cakes go horribly, hilariously wrong.)

I subscribed to the feed in my Google Reader (they should start paying me to plug them), and the latest post was on Dora.

Check it out....very funny.

prayers.for.meredith

Our little Meredith needs some prayer. She came out to me this evening just in tears about having to go to sleep.

She's mentioned that she's had dreams about monsters before, but she hasn't gone into any detail. Tonight, she told me that she didn't want to go to sleep because of all of the monsters in her dreams.

I asked her what the monsters were doing, and she said that they were chasing her and trying to kill her. My heart is just broken. I'm teary-eyed just typing this. (kind of makes my last post about my luggage seem not so important, huh?)

I mean, honestly, we don't watch scary things in our house or anything. I'm even afraid of scary movies, and I refuse to watch them. Always have. Even if the t.v. is on in our house for a sporting event or something and an intense commercial comes on, we either change the channel or make our kids not look at the t.v.

I prayed with her this evening right after she told me (and she was calmed down by then), and her little lip was quivering and she was starting to cry again as I was praying about it. So, guess who else was crying....yep, you guessed it...me. I just feel so helpless about the whole situation.

I remember having bad nightmares as a kid, and I'm pretty sure it's something that all kids go though, but I'm just asking for some prayers for her as you're reminded. Thank you.

are.you.kidding.me?

Picture me about to pull my hair out.

Picture me on the verge of swearing...a lot. (just on the verge)

Deep breaths. Deep breaths.

I just got off the phone with the airline regarding my damaged bag.

Yes, it's been 3 weeks and it's still not resolved. Really? Three weeks! How hard is this??

So, I've been passed around to about 5 different people, and finally today I get an answer about how much they are going to give me for my bag.

Drum roll please......

$9.

Yes, I typed that right. $9. For my bag...that was in perfect condition when I dropped it off, paid $30 to have it checked (round trip), and returned to me falling apart in two different spots.

I was asked on several occasions what brand of bag that I owned. It wasn't branded, although I could have lied about it and said, you know, Samsonite or something expensive like that! No, no, not Jackie. She would certainly NOT lie about something like that (something like how many cookies I ate...maybe...but not luggage).

Anyway, so they are so sorry for the problems and will send me $9 for my bag and a travel voucher for $50 for the next time I fly on their airline. The next time? I don't think I'll be travelling with them again.

Ok, and in the meantime, I have purchased another bag for another travel date because I don't know when they will get me a new bag or a money for a new bag.

"Ma'am, we cannot pay for that bag." I don't want you to pay for my bag...I want you to pay $40 for my OTHER bag...that was fully functional before you lost it and destroyed it!

So, Monday morning (when manager Beth is in again), I am going to be giving her a call sometime between 10 am and 6:30 pm. You can bet that at around 10:02 there will be a nice children's video playing at our house and a phone call being made to manager Beth.

Hopefully, I'll be much calmer by then and will not sound so irate on the phone. I will be collecting my thoughts and writing my notes out. And if this isn't resolved, my faithful blogger buddies will all know which airline NOT to fly on the next time you travel.

Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Seriously $9?

seriously.may.12

Meredith was picking her nose and eating it the other day while we were sitting on the couch.

I said, "Meredith, please stop picking your nose and eating your boogers. That's gross."

She responds, "I'm not eating my boogers, I'm eating my snot!"

....well, then, on with it...that's not nearly as disgusting.

Seriously.

I can't make this stuff up.

can't.sit.still

Little Miss cannot sit still to save her life! This picture pretty much sums up TWO attempts to take her 1 year pictures (and we're a month behind already!).

AND, if I can get her to sit for two seconds, she doesn't smile. We'll try again soon! :)

 

my.mom.totally.embarrasses.me

...that is what Claire is going to say when she's 14 and she reads this post.

This was our conversation from this afternoon...

Setup: Claire is in the playroom and I am in the kitchen.

Claire: Don't come in here, Mom!

Me: Ok.

Claire: Do you know why?

Me: No. (and she didn't look like she was up to anything too sneaky, so I wasn't concerned)

Claire: Well, don't come in here.

Me: Ok.

Claire: Do you know what I did?

Me: (Now I'm just going to amuse her so that she quits asking.) Ummm...did you bake me a cake?

Claire: Nooooo.

Me: Did you.....(I'm trying to think of something silly)...fart?

Claire: YEEESSSS! Did you smell it?

Me: No.

Claire: Well, don't come in here because it's really stinky!! It kind of smells like Daddy's toots! His are a little stinkier though. (rather matter-of-factly)

Me: (Totally laughing at this point) Daddy would be proud.

...now Josh might be embarrassed as well. Probably not though...I mean, really, who's toots don't stink?

 

sanity.for.40.cents

This bottle right here is pure sanity. I'm a MAJOR store-brand purchaser. The last time I purchased cooking spray, I bought the store brand.

The cap was extremely hard to take off each time I wanted to use it. I finally just left it off and put it away (mind you, this was something that bothered me every time I did it...weird, I know).

So, the last time I went shopping at the store, I purchased this little bottle of sanity for just 40 cents more than the store brand bottle of INsanity.

You just twist that little top to the left....spray....and twist it back to the right. "Simple Touch Spray" should actually be in the small letters. "Click & Go nozzle" is what should be in big, bold letters.

Ah, the simple things in life. :)

 

bad.day

I'm kind of having a bad evening, and I kind of feel like crying about it. Let's see...what would Meredith do (at 19 months)....cry, slobber, scream, throw herself on the floor, drool on the floor, cry a little more...

I probably won't do those things...at least not the screaming.

By the way...I remember the night that this picture was taken of Meredith. Josh and I obviously thought it was funny enough to take pictures! And it was. I'm glad no one is taking pictures of me right now.

All will be better tomorrow. It almost always is, you know.

 

seriously.may.1

I sent a Christmas card to our friends, Jim and Kelly on December 18 (at least that's the postmark).

It was returned to me on Wednesday (April 28) as "undeliverable" because they had moved and there was no forwarding address.

Seriously.