Oh my goodness,

I let another week go by without posting. We were travelers this week. We went to Tennessee to visit my in-laws, pick up Claire and to attend one of Jason's shows. A show at which he sold six paintings the first night! Eeek Squeak!

So that pretty much sums up last week. We did have an awful lot of doctor visits and once I have some answers, I'll update everyone on those situations. (One situation calls for me to collect a certain someone's poop. So gross.)

Nora is getting pretty good at crawling and now she can go from the floor to a full sitting position. Time is flying by!

The one where I take it all in.

Instead of hanging it down by her side, as usual, she had placed her little arm on my arm; flesh against flesh. Her fingers raised and wiggled involuntarily. Her breath shuddered as it went out because she had spent the last few minutes crying in her crib. Her little head was sweaty from the exertion and when I bowed down to kiss it, I smelled the sweet baby smell that seems to vanish as soon as they have their first birthday. Every now and then, she would lift her head to give me a short stare while sucking violently on her pacifier and then slowly lay her head back down on my chest and close her eyes.  She needed her mommy.  What a blessing.

Flash Back

Caboodle. Say that word over and over to yourself. Caboodle. Cah-boodle. Ca-Boodle. Do you remember Caboodles? They were a must-have to any girl between the ages of 9 and 19. My older sister and I were just talking about how fun it is when you are young and you actually get the gift that you had asked and dreamed of getting and our conversation landed on The Caboodle. She said she never truly believed that she would own one and when her birthday arrived and the glorious gift appeared, it was uh-ma-zing. Andrea Gunn had nothing on her and Andrea was by far the coolest girl we knew. 

That word, Caboodle, became as common and normal sounding to us as curling iron, or soap. But tonight, as were talking, I realized just how hilarious that word is. Caboodle. Who came up with that? Now I can't stop laughing.

"Hey, let me just grab my Caboodle and I'll be ready to go."  

"Has anyone seen my Caboodle?" 

"What color is your Caboodle? My Caboodle is pink and green and has a peach latch. Boo-Ya!"

Good stuff, people. Good stuff.

I love this.

I read this tonight on my friend's blog:

WHAT A BABY COSTS BY EDGAR GUEST

"How much do babies cost?" said he
The other night upon my knee;
And then I said: "They cost a lot;
A lot of watching by a cot,
A lot of sleepless hours and care,
A lot of heartache and despair,
A lot of fear and trying dread,
And sometimes many tears are shed
In payment for our babies small,
But every one is worth it all.

"For babies people have to pay
A heavy price from day to day--
There is no way to get one cheap.
Why, sometimes when they're fast asleep
You have to get up in the night
And go and see that they're all right.
But what they cost in constant care
And worry, does not half compare
With what they bring of joy and bliss...
You'd pay much more for just a kiss.

"Who buys a baby has to pay
A portion of the bill each day;
He has to give his time and thought
Unto the little one he's bought.
He has to stand a lot of pain
Inside his heart and not complain;
And pay with lonely days and sad
For all the happy hours he's had.
All this a baby costs, and yet
His smile is worth it all, you bet."

The one where I say absolutely nothing important.

Oops. A whole week went by. Sorry. I wish I could say that we have been so busy that there has been zero time to type a post, and I guess I could say that, but it would be a lie. Ha. The first time I wrote that sentence I typed lit instead of lie. A lit. It would have been a lit.  I think the one and a half hour of sleep I got last night might be coming in to play now. I am having to erase every other word and retype it.
Here's a snip-it of what's been going on.

1. We have ants. Lots and lots of ants. They are on the kitchen counter and they are crawling out from under the trim in our bathroom. (I originally typed, out from under the basement. That makes no sense. And we don't even have a basement.) At first, I put one of the little squares that come with the ant poison kit on the floor in the bathroom but the square wasn't big enough to accommodate all the ants so eventually I just poured it straight on the tile in a big S (you know, for Sacran) and let them go to town on the stuff. It was so gross.  I now have about 200 dead ants and some old poison on the bathroom floor. I think it's time to get out the Swiffer. 
2. Jason is painting a demo at some event in The Town and he had to go dressed as an Italian painter. I haven't seen his outfit yet because I wasn't here when he got ready but I bet it's great. I'm excited to see him and shout in a whisper so as not to wake the chilluns, "Bongiorno!"
3. I cannot get enough of What's My Line on YouTube.
4. I went to Memphis and came back home in less than 24 hours over the weekend. And I took all the girls with me. Maybe that's what's wrong with me. 
5. Nora started crawling this week and she's cutting two teeth. It's been such a big week for her, little Cutie Patootie. She also is running her first fever. :(

That's about it. Ciao!

A little baby, a little craziness and little bit of exhaustion.

Guess what I learned? You can't take a baby into the theater after 5pm. Want to know how I found out? Sit back, grab a cup of coffee and I'll begin...
I have been wanting to see the movie The Help ever since Big Mama wrote about it on her blog. That was a while back. Maybe even a month ago. I tried to get a group together to go see it about three weeks ago but the plan fell through. Then I went on a double date with some friends and I thought for sure we would watch it but the guys weren't really into the idea and we ended up doing the movie run-around and finally just sat in on the last 20 minutes of a very dumb movie. (That story is another post for another day.) 

So, when my cousin posted on Facebook that she was going to go see the movie last night and anyone that wanted to join her should show up, my brain started rolling out ideas of how I could find a babysitter. Jason was gone for a paint-out so he wasn't an option. Finally, I called Misty for babysitter references and she said to just bring the girls over to her house. She and Thomas had seen the movie last week (NOW he decides he wants to see it) and her kids would love to play with the girls. I met Mom in town and she hopped in our van and we ran to Target to get some essentials before dropping the girls off. One thing I had to buy was a new laundry hamper for my room. The old wicker basket I had from 8 years ago finally gave up the ghost on Monday. I was about to push the cart out the doors when I noticed the new hamper had a big hole in the side. So Mom took the girls out to the van and I ran to the service desk to make a quick exchange. Finally, we were all loaded up and we dashed over to Misty's house.  I ran the girls inside, heated up a bottle for Nora and we took off.

Incidentally, I have come to the realization that I was overfeeding Nora. If she gets more than 6oz she is in spit-up city.

Anyway, I heated up 9 oz. because I wanted to feed her and then have a little left over in case I needed it in the theater. Mom feed her the bottle on the way and before I realized what was happening, she had guzzled the whole bottle.  We ran inside, hoping that we had made it before the movie had started. Now, insert the first paragraph here. I was turned away. Forsaken. Cast aside. And all because of cute, fatty-licious, smiling, drooling Nora James. I sent Mom on in and I headed back out to the van very bummed and a little aggravated.

I had locked my keys and my purse in the van.  I hadn't realized I had left them in there before this because we had bought our tickets earlier when I had met up with Mom so this time when we got there we just walked right on in. I didn't panic because it is for reasons like this that we pay the AAA people. But then I realized my AAA card was also locked in the car and on it the number to call for help.  I went back in the theater and asked the man to please let me and chubs run into Theater 5 so I
could see if any of the other ladies had a triple A card.  He did and they didn't. So, back out to the lobby we go and I start calling anyone and everyone trying to find someone at home who could get online and look up the number for me. I finally succeeded and the man said it would be 30-45 minutes before help arrived.

I called Misty and let her know what was up and she suggested I go next door to the yogurt shop and eat a treat while I waited. Wonderful idea, I thought. I could use a little pick-me-up. I saddled up Nora and we made the trek up to YoLo. Once there, I started to look around and concoct my dessert in my head. And then I remembered that my wallet was in the van and of course my money was in my wallet. So I walked around and looked at the paintings on the wall and visited with the girl behind the counter.  Oh yeah, and I forgot to mention that the whole time all this was going on, Nora had been dousing me over and over again with spit-up. It was so much that it had soaked all the way through my jeans and my spanx to my underwear.

Finally. the helper man showed up and I was able to get in my van and get the girls and go home.

And now you know why I didn't finish painting my room last night.

And, to top it off, when I got home, I emptied my pockets and found the cash the movie place had given me when they refunded my ticket. You know, right before I went to the yogurt shop and didn't get yogurt because I didn't have any cash.

It's my days like this that have prompted my sister to make her phone play this song whenever I call.

Whoops!

In case you were wanting to try it, here's the link to the blog post about the craft crib:
http://alittlelearningfortwo.blogspot.com/2011/08/repurposed-cot.html.  I feel really bad because I saw this picture somewhere, thought it was really neat and posted about it. I never thought that people would think I did this project. I guess I assumed that the four people who read this blog would just know that I am not that clever. I learned two things. 1) There are more than four people who read this blog. 2) Never re-post a picture without including the link.
So, I'm very sorry to A Little Learning for Two  for temporarily "stealing" her idea. I would have posted her link earlier but I couldn't remember where I saw the picture. Thankfully, it was re-posted on Facebook again this morning. (I'm thinking Melissa might have something to do with that. ?) 

Next time I'll get it right.

Shabby Apple

Shabby Apple is one of my favorite on-line shopping stores. All their dresses are cute, decent and have a vintage flair. I have two dresses from this store but my favorite is Pina Colada. (In the yellow of course.)
They also have cute maternity clothes, little girl dresses and lots of accessories.   Ahh, to have spending money again..... :)

If you decide you want to order something from them, feel free to click on my link since I am now an affiliate. Woo Hoo!

Vote for Jason! Vote for Jason!

It probably isn't proper blogger etiquette to ask these kind of favors, but if you have a Facebook account, please go here:  http://faso.com/boldbrush/painting/25425 and "like" Jason's painting so he can stay in the lead.

Thanks in advance!

The Sacrans

Monday already?

I am having so many issues with Blogger right now. I want to add a gadget on the left side and it just won't cooperate. Is anyone else having problems?


I have a confession and it's an embarrassing one. A few weeks back, I started the HCG diet along with my mom. I did it for about a week (maybe?) and then I had a guilt trip because I was feeding Nora goat milk more than nursing her and my milk supply was steadily decreasing. So I quit. Mom kept going like the disciplined solider that she is and once more I started completely nursing again. Nora's seemingly decreasing spitting-up came back with a flourish. And I should clarify that when I say spit-up I really mean gushing vomit. Obviously, the goat milk is easier for her little tummy to digest than breast milk so we decided to go ahead and put her on just a goat milk diet.

Since my milk supply didn't matter any more, I decided to get back on the HCG diet and lose the baby weight. Guess what? I was a total flop of a dieter. I did it for one day.

One. Day.

It's embarrassing to admit. But really, it wasn't good for me because I had very low energy on that diet and it was hard for me to keep up with the house and the girls. It was my very first time to try a diet and I failed. Miserably.
But my sister was doing Weight Watchers and I decided I would try that and see what happened. Guess what? I love it! It is so easy for me to do and I'm not hungry at all. Woo Hoo! I'm not a complete mess- diet wise.

I'm off to start painting my room at 9:30 at night. I never do these things sensibly.

She's growing up! Oh wait, never mind.

Yesterday, I had to run some errands and take Claire for her 5 year check-up so Jason stayed home with Elaina and Eily. He was trying to get a lot of painting done but the girls were very restless and needy so he decided to take them on a walk to burn off some energy. They walked around the block and down to the cemetery and on the way back they passed a large drainage ditch. There is usually a tricking of water that runs through the ditch and maybe a piece or two of trash. As they were walking by, Eily said in very slow and dramatically mysterious voice, "Ooohh, There's probably a shark in there." Elaina, very exasperatingly responded, "Eily, there is not a shark in there."

Jason smiled to himself as he realized that Elaina had reached the age that logic prevails over gullible-ness. (Is that a word?) She had reached a level of maturity new to the children of our family.

Then Elaina said, " But there probably is a crocodile."

Craft Crib

What a cool. fun way to repurpose your crib.

Iiiiiiit's Monday!!!

The new week has started! It always feels good to start fresh. I'm glad it comes around every 7 days. Elaina had a fever on Saturday so Sunday Jason stayed home with her while I took the other 3 girls to church. He had a root canal earlier in the week so he didn't mind resting and taking it easy. He said it feels like someone broke his jaw.

Elaina is over her little fever virus so today is going to be a good beginning to a good week of school. Bring on the learning!!

I'm feeling a little Martha Stewartish this morning. I'm sure it's the weather and I'm wondering if I should try to do a fall craft with the girls. I always want to do these things and everyone is so excited when we start and then about halfway through it all falls apart. Someone cries because they don't like their finished product, someone cries because they've spilled glue (or something just as messy) all over them, and then I lose my cool and the whole thing becomes something very unpleasant.

Last week we finally did our first entry in our nature journals. The girls LOVED it and I did too. The only bad part was that we weren't able to do it until about three in the afternoon so we were sweating pretty bad by the time we came in. Eily gave up pretty fast but that's ok. She's three.  Elaina and Claire did their own Nature Study the next day while playing outside. I was really excited when I overheard their plans.

I've stayed on top of the housework for a whole week. I started doing the baby steps from Fly Lady again. I did them right after I had Eily and it was the calmest time of my mother-life. So my sister, Leah, asked me to do it with her again and I really felt it would be a good start to getting my household back in order. It's been a little crazy since before Nora was born.

And speaking of Nora, I hear her squealing in her bed. I'm off to get some baby smiles!