Alexandra's Hair donation

Alexandra has a big heart! She also has the ability to grow LOTS of hair! She loves her hair, which proves that if she is willing to cut it and donate it to someone who can't grow their hair, she has a very BIG heart! She wanted to donate her hair (again) only this time she didn't want it to be short when she got it cut. So, she grew it and grew it until she was approaching a nice Rapunzel length...and finally this week she donated again. We had been measuring 8 inches and she was contemplating how that would look. Would her hair still be long enough for her to be happy and comfortable heading back to 6th grade? Well, before we left for the haircut we pulled up the donation information. OOPS. Locks of Love minimum is 10 inches. Pantene Beautiful lengths was 8 inches. Alexandra said "I don't want to donate my hair to a woman! I want to donate to a kid!" Hmmmm...ok. Glad I'm not the lady waiting for a wig! But, I get the point. It was her plan all along to donate to a child. Now her dilema was whether she was ok giving up 10 inches instead of 8. She decided to go for it!

Before

After

I know I am a little biased, but I think she looks beautiful! She looks so grown up and I think she feels that way too! Look out 6th grade, here she comes!

When Alexandra was 4 she donated her hair for the first time. Even then she was concerned about children who couldn't grow their hair. (And she was miserable every time we tried to fix her hair.) But I really felt like she was proud to donate her hair even at such a young age.

Before

After

A year and a half ago I also gave up my locks for someone who needed them more than I did.

Before/After

If at first you don't succeed, try, try again!

Okay, here I go again...

It feels like confession...It has been 5 months since my last blog post.

Whew, has a lot happened. Well, in my last post I was celebrating/mourning the sale of our house. It was a good house. Though two houses we DID NOT need! So fortunately someone did buy our house so we could move on to our next adventure.

We packed up, moved down the street and stacked everything we owned into either our garage, storage unit or laundry room. We were fortunate our house sold quickly but because of this we didn't have much time to get the new house ready. We had all new wood floors installed while we were away on spring break in Boston.

When we returned, they were ALMOST done. So, we stayed in a hotel for 2 nights so they could finish applying the finish to the floors. We LOVE them! It was worth the inconvenience of the extra hotel nights and having to then move everything into the house by ourselves. (a process we are still trying to complete 4 months later.) Since our new house is smaller, we are still trying to sort out what goes where and what gets "eliminated". We could do our own reality show on moving..."I'm sorry, we no longer have a need for you so you have been eliminated!" I must say we were getting close to getting the garage cleared out until we decided to empty out the storage unit we had rented. Out of sight was not out of mind. It was nagging. Paying $100/month to store things we most likely didn't need anyway was a little ridiculous. So, now it is here and just waiting for BJ and me to be able to tackle it together. My goal was to park in the garage by the time school starts. (Um...one week left!)

The house is coming along. It is becoming more and more ours every day. I have a stack of remodeling magazines about 2 feet high! We have been discussing the changes we want to make to the house and the timeline. There is a lot up in the air. In the meantime, we are making things work as best they can and trying to be patient. Looking out the windows at the lake makes it all worth it. It really is a beautiful sight!

We have had a great summer!

Christian started off the summer with 2 weeks of basketball camp which he LOVED! He has also done a couple of soccer camps. His fall soccer season started this past weekend. I love watching his games. He has so much fun.

We went on vacation with our dear friends the Hunts. This year was to Virginia. We called it our "Laycation" which is a combination of Lazy and Vacation. Ahhhhh...much needed R&R. We had one side trip to Williamsburg which was HOT but fun! We went there on the 4th of July which seemed fitting. It was a neat place to watch fireworks. Other than that, our biggest moves we made all week were going to the beach or the pool.

After we returned home from vacation, we had 4 days to finish 4-H projects before heading to my parents in Indiana for 2 weeks. My kids do 4-H there because we don't have any clubs near us. They love it. Every year (even when I was in 4-H) we swear to start/complete the projects earlier. Every year we are still down to the wire completing them on time. Maybe next year? We had a great time with my parents and getting to see Tim, Jenny and Abby.

At the end of the two weeks I was able to attend my 21st reunion. (Unconventional, I know. We just couldn't get it pulled together in time for the 20th. If it weren't for Facebook, I don't think it would have happened at all!) It was a great time! I had never been back for a reunion and am so glad we were able to go this time! Below is a picture of my High School BFF and her husband Craig. We are on the front porch of her parents home. (This is where BJ and I had our official first date! Shannon said "We are going to a Henry Lee Summer concert. Get a date!" She was skeptical when I said I thought I would ask this guy I met in my summer class at Purdue. Here we are 20 years later married to those boys we asked to the Henry Lee Summer concert!)

Since we have been back home we have caught up on piano lessons, gone to the pool and down to the lake and have tried to get more of the house unpacked and organized. I've been a little lax on getting things ready for school to start. I think I am in denial that summer is almost over. I LOVE SUMMER! I was meant to live somewhere we have summer 365 days a year. The kids have had their moments but overall we have had a nice summer together.

We are busy, but blessed! I will try to be better about journaling our life. I'm heading to my Outlook calendar right now to put reminders to myself to keep up this time!

Things to come that will surely be blog-worthy...1st day of school and our upcoming trip to Paris!! Yeah!!

Another reason today is a good day!!!!

I almost forgot that the other reason today is a good day is that my college friends are driving here and we are doing our annual girls weekend! This time we are staying in Cleveland and it will ROCK! Can't wait!

Today is a good day!

Well, last night we signed a purchase agreement to sell our home! It is bittersweet because it was, of course, not as much money as we would have liked to get. But in this market we didn't expect to be impressed with the amount of money someone offered us. Selling in 7 weeks is something to be grateful for. We had tried to prepare ourselves for months of double mortgage and stress. So, having it over is very good for everyone (and the ulcer my stomach is trying to create! We will save so much money on Prevacid that it is worth it!)

It is hard to give up a home you have put such care and love into. We have lived in our home for 4 years. During that time we have really made it our own. We have painted every wall. We have purchased furniture for the first time in our marriage. It has been fun and challenging all at the same time. We were forced to put in all new flooring when our refrigerator decided to leak water under the wood floors. Stressful! But in the long run it made our home even more beautiful. We have been blessed to be here and to share our home with our family and friends! This home is now a house we will pass on to someone else to make it their own. Thanks for being a great home!

Now, onto the next house and the journey of making it our home! Here's to the potential it has, the vision we have and most of all...here's to the view! Cheers to you new house! May you become our home and be the place we will create many, many memories and share with our family and friends for years, and years and years to come!

Wow, I am so bad at this!

I was just looking at someone else's blog and it reminded me of exactly how bad I am at keeping up with this!

In a nutshell...
Great Thanksgiving
Great Christmas
Great New Year
Shortly after the new year began, we found out for sure we weren't moving out of state. (That has been hanging over us since last June!)

Ironically, my dear hubby had scheduled a showing on another house here in town to look at. It was the day after we got confirmation we weren't moving...at least not away. My mom had sent me an email that same day that included a quote that said "Coincidence is when God decides to remain anonymous."

We looked at the house, made an offer, it was accepted and then, holy moly we had to get our house ready to put on the market! We met with our realtor and he and dear hubby decided to get it on the market in 2 DAYS! Somebody is trying to kill me! Not to mention that we were getting ready for our girls/guys weekends we had given the kids for Christmas!

So, when our BEST, BEST Friends arrived from Texas for the girls weekend to Chicago (the night before BJ and CJ flew out for the guys weekend in Texas) we were putting finishing touches on the house to get it on the market and I kid you not, Jenn was helping us sweep leaves out of the garage at 1:00 am while we took some things to the storage unit we rented. Happy girls weekend! If I knew how to do that fun linking this to another blog like she does then you could see what a great time we had once we finally got out of town and to Chicago...but I don't. Jenn-if you want to tell me how, that would be great! Anyway, after a longer than necessary trip to get there, it was great! We loved the American Girl Store and luncheon! The guys had an equally (although much more testosterone infused) great time!

Now back to the house on the market...over 30 people have been through, but no offers! It only takes one and I'm praying it will be sooner rather than later so that I don't have to deal with a bleeding ulcer! :)

To be continued...

My little angels!

It's happened before. It happened today. It will happen again.

Okay. My text to my dear hubby tonight was "When will you be here because I just quit my job." I'm guessing there was a sense of urgency on his part. Not because without my job we can't pay the bills--I don't get a paycheck. The urgency comes from the fact that my job is to take care of these three small people God has entrusted us with and to try to keep our lives and household functioning. These very large tasks would be difficult to do if you no longer have someone in charge.

I'm sorry for all of the times I took my mom for granted and for all of the times I was probably disrespectful and unappreciative. This is truly the most difficult job I have ever had! I love them. That is what makes it even worse when I feel that they don't treat me well. I ask myself what I have done wrong. I'm sure it is just because I am with them almost all of the time and I am the one who has to nag all of the time to keep our lives running. I'm not the fun, cool mom they wish they had, I'm sure. I may have to turn in my keys, stop using the stove, vacuum, washing machine....and then see if they have a new-found appreciation for what "My mom who doesn't do anything" really does. Yes, my oldest actually went through the list of parents of her friends who wanted to do a school service project together. They needed a chaperone. She finally got to me and declared that I was the only one who didn't have anything to do so I would have to do it.

And today, trying to help the middle one with a school science project he is doing with a friend...he would never treat anyone else the way he treated me. (Certainly not his friend's mom who he declared 2 years ago was the nicest mom in the world!) And by the way, his friend would never have spoken to that perfect mom the way my darling son spoke to me. Of the three, he is usually such a hard worker and usually so concientious with me. He's my boy. He usually is the first to thank me for random little things I do. He seems to notice more often the little things I do. But occasionally, like today, he chose to be disrespectful when I was taking my afternoon to work on a science project with him (since I have nothing better to do). Like raking all of the leaves that are staring at me through the back door, finishing the laundry, washing bedding, fixing dinner, getting the kids to piano, cleaning out the closet that is driving me crazy, sorting through the stacks of papers they bring home, cleaning, cleaning, cleaning, grocery shopping...I'm so glad that I live such a life of leisure!

The little one--already was grounded for her sass yesterday. She was scolding me for being silly and nice after I told her she didn't have time to watch a movie before school. So I demonstrated what mean, grouchy mommy could be like. I asked her which mommy she liked better--her answer? Mrs. O. (my friend!)

So, today I quit. Unfortunately when the alarm goes off in the morning, someone has to do the job. So again, I will go back to work and do the job. I will love them. I never stop. I just hope at some point we work it out better than we have over the last week. For now, I will sleep. I'm gonna need it! It's like hitting the refresh button--sometimes it works better than others. I hope tonight my refresh button works and I hope that my kids all find theirs. I sensed remorse when I got home from my Girl Scout leader meeting--we will see if they can find it in themselves, at least for tomorrow, to give me a break!