Stuff...

Today was really a pretty good day. I like when those happen. It's not that they are terribly rare, but still...I love a really good day. (Who doesn't, really?)

So, I got to sleep all night--except for Ben climbing in my bed, I was relatively uninterrupted. Levi slept all night. It is amazing how much better he sleeps when he is in a crib. That started my day off much better--sleep with do that for you.

Then I got to go to my book club meeting. I loved it! I love that us girls can sit there for hours and visit and talk about something we love (books!) and eat and just relax. I don't know how much it means for everyone else, but for me, it is seriously a highlight of my month. I love that we DO actually discuss the book, and we have a real discussion about the merits of the book, and review it, and discuss specific elements of the story, instead of just sitting around gossiping while calling it "book club." Does that make me a total nerd? Probably. Oh well. Whether it does or not, I love that I have a group of friends who love reading probably as much as I do with whom I can have an intellectual discussion about books. I love that I feel like my opinion is respected and that no one is thinking what I say is dumb.

The book we read this past month was Atonement, by Ian McEwan. I didn't love the book. I did, however, really appreciate the book. Does that make sense? I appreciate that it really did make me think. I had to work to read it...which I liked at some points, because I had to think, but I hated at other times, because it made it hard to escape into the book, which is a lot of why I love reading. I think the descriptions in the book were wonderful...but there was WAY too much of it! The author got really wordy, and while I realize that a lot of that is due to the character that was "writing" the story, it still kind of drove me nuts. I think what I need to do is read another book by the author to decide if it is HIS writing style that I didn't like, or if it was simply the writing style of the character. Sometimes it was hard to sift through the info. to get to the meat of the story though. Basically, I think the book was definitely worth reading. I will even probably reread it at some point (after I work through some of the HUGE pile I have been accumulating next to my bed) and I am sure I will appreciate it even more. I even liked the storyline--I just hated the wordiness. Overall, I gave it a 3/5. Next month's book is The Time-Traveler's Wife. I am looking forward to reading it, but I don't have it yet, so it will be a little bit before I read it. I am probably going to order it online.

As far as the soap opera of my life goes, well...Ben is trying to master the concept of wiping himself after he poops. It is NOT my favorite thing. I thought it would be a wonderful day when he was potty trained...but then I realized that at least in diapers, the poop is contained. For the second day in a row, he has flooded the bathroom by putting seriously half a roll of Charmin Ultra double roll 2-ply toilet paper in the toilet. Apparently he is trying to wipe himself, which is great, but I haven't been able to get him to understand the SMALL amount concept. On top of that, the toilet has basically come unsealed from the floor, so there is a bit of leaking going on--I bought a new wax ring and some caulk to fix it, and that is going to have to be the project of the evening. Ick. Did I mention that rubber gloves are involved in this too?

In good news, Cameron brought home Sonic the Hedgehog for the Xbox. I am a total dork, but I like that game. However, it is stupid with the way it restarts when you die. We have gotten fed up and are going to have a Guitar Hero III head to head! I will kick his butt, to be sure, but I still will let Cameron THINK he has a chance. :)

Rainy Days and Mondays...

Grr--I haven't figured out how to make the stupid pictures organize themselves in the order that I would like. It's irritating. Anyway, these are the things I got accomplished today. I finished Maddy's wall hangings--they have been sitting, unfinished, for a long time. I finally sewed the border and painted the frames, and got them all finished. Aren't they totally cute? After I finished, I almost wanted to keep them cause they are so stinking adorable!

The other project is the shower curtain I have been working on for months. I know it is sideways--I was too lazy to rotate the picture before uploading it--pathetic, huh? Anyway, the countertops in the bathroom are blue, so I wanted to tie in the blue without having to decorate with blue. Actually really like the bright colors--I was worried when I first hung it up, but I think I really like it. I put grommets in the top for the hooks. I haven't totally decided how I am going to hang it, if I am going to keep the hooks or use the cute orange ribbon I bough. Either way, it is FINALLY done!! I am so happy about it!

Today was pretty much a blah day. It was icy...again. So, once again, there was no school. I was bound and determined to get something done since I was home all day. The house still looks like a bomb hit it though--Cameron was working from home, and Levi was sick all day, so I didn't get nearly as much done as I would have liked. I got the boys' rooms cleaned up and a couple loads of laundry done and I did make some homemade cream of broccoli soup (we even had bread bowls, although I cheated and didn't make those because I was doing some other stuff).

I wanted to post a couple pictures from yesterday--these are from the boys' little birthday celebration we did after dinner last night. We had cake (it was sickeningly sweet, and I LOVE cake!) and ice cream. The boys had gotten their presents earlier in the day. We gave Sam his gift yesterday because our original intention had been to let him pick out a gift, but then he got sick (you might recall...). Both boys loved their gifts, so that is great.

Cameron and the babies--isn't Maddy getting so fat and cute? She has the cutest little pixie ears and the most precious smile--she is the smiliest baby I have ever seen. She has been smiling since she was like 2 weeks old (real smiles!) and laughing out loud since about 2 months. My kids still barely laugh out loud--at least Levi.

Here are some of the ice shots from today. They are not as impressive as the ice storm from before Christmas, but still...it is a pretty good one. We had one heck of a thunderstorm to go with it--lightning, thunder, hail, and a lot of rain and sleet (and freezing rain--did you know there is a difference between sleet and freezing rain?).
We'll see what tomorrow brings. It was supposed to continue raining until about midnight, and the low is about 20 tonight, with windchills below 10, so it'll probably freeze again. I apologize for the disorganized nature of this post. I had lots of pics to post and was being too lazy to make them do exactly what I wanted--frankly, I find blogger to be a huge pain in the rear, and am considering using a different host.