NOT! I swear when it rains it pours. I awoke to a huge puddle of water in front of my house this morning. Now, the temp is -8 with a windchill of -20, so I definitely should not have had standing water. I called Bill freaked out and he had me call the village. I think it is a water main break. However, nobody bothered to come to my door. Instead, they just turned off my water. I just realized it when I tried to make Will his diluted version of juice. Needless to say, I am ticked. I called the village, and they won’t give me an ETA at all. I seriously would love to know if I need to send Bill out for water or what. I seriously am trying not to be highly irritated right now. I could be working on things like Increasing Blog Article Quality or doing some of my freelance work. Instead, I am standing in my front window watching my village dig a huge hole in my street and trying to figure out what to make for dinner with no water. Also, try explaining to a 5 year old why she can’t flush the toilet after we have spent 2 years drilling it into her head that she needs to flush the toilet.
I know there are way bigger things in life I should be concerned about, but man this is irritating.
How do you clean up after the holidays? For us, it is a tad more interesting. Madison’s birthday was yesterday (she turned 5!), so we always have the quick cleanup that needs to be done from the time we get back from visiting Wisconsin and her birthday party. I usually get about a week if we are lucky. Since we have the basement now, Bill let me keep up the Christmasy decorations, but we did pull down the Christmas tree. I need as much room as we can get, and this is pretty much the only way I was going to get it. I figure everybody will hang out downstairs for her party just like they did for Christmas Eve. The sad thing is that we are the only one on the block who still has their outdoor lights up. Now, we don’t leave them up till June or anything, but it seems that it is kinda odd that on 8th of January that everyone has packed up everything already. Now, I’ve slacked this week, and I have to get all my cleaning done tomorrow with the kids underfoot. This should be interesting. My sister is arriving tomorrow, so its not quite the end of the world if she’s the only one who sees my non-clean house.
How do you clean up? Do you have a set plan? Do you just do a little bit each day?
Now is the time of the year to talk with your kids about fire safety. With many of us stuck in our homes (see the post before this about being snowed in) and having real Christmas trees, this is a talk we all need to have. Even if you don’t have a real tree, your kids definitely need to know what to do if a fire would happen to break out. I know that everyone thinks it won’t happen to them. However, I am sure that the people who have house fires think that also.
Liberty Mutual has a great website dedicated to being fire smart. This is a great way to start a conversation with your kids. There are some great forms on this site that help you develop your fire plan and to just help you start the conversation. Even though my kids are still pretty little, this is a conversation we started having with Madison last year already. They even have sections especially for children, parents, and educators. You are also able to search your local firehouses and learn about them too!
Be safe this holiday season and make sure you check out BeFireSmart just in case.
It is terrible here in Illinois. This is what my house looks like this morning:
We broke our back door trying to open it this morning. My house is a sheet of ice. We have about 4 inches of snow. On top of that, we have freezing rain, so it is definitely an interesting combination we have going on out there. We watched the traffic report starting quite early this morning, and at this point, Bill isn’t even going to try and go to work. The bad thing is that he left his laptop at work, so he’s trying to do what he can from his cell phone. It actually was hailing and snowing at the same time this morning if you can believe it. We are hoping to take the kids out a tad later and maybe build a snowman. However, the snow is more like ice chunks, so I don’t know how easy that is going to be.
TThis post is sponsored, but the ideas, thoughts and ramblings are my own.
Since having kids, I turned into a big softie. Yes, I’ll actually admit it. I cry at things I never would have before, and I think about things that never would have crossed my mind before having kids. I’ll be honest here — I get all teary eyed at Sears new commercials. Their new campaign is about how one gift can change someone’s life. Since I absolutely love Ty Pennington, I thought I’d show you what he had to say:
Okay, now that I’ve got myself composed again, I need to tell you what wishes Sears answered for my family. I was provided a $100 gift card from Sears that we were able to use this weekend.
Bill and I bundled the kids off early yesterday morning and headed off to Sears. I luck out since Sears is actually walking distance from my house, and we actually shop their quite a bit — off the top of my head, we got a bench, our snowblower, and our lawnmower from there. However, on this trip, we had no idea what we were going to get. My Christmas shopping is pretty much done, so we were going to try to find something for the kids.
The first place we checked out was the outdoor decorations. Madison is always wanting more for our yard, and this isn’t something we spend a lot of money on. Shortly after this picture was taken, Will decided to lay on the floor and talk to one of the deer that they had for a decoration. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get the camera out fast enough to get that embarrassing photo of him. Nothing really caught our eye in this department, so we headed over to toys. Of course, there were a lot of toys to pick from, but really, my kids don’t need another $100 worth of toys right before Christmas. Since the favorite part of any store for my husband is electronics, we headed to that department.
Once we were in electronics, my husband immediately walked towards the TVs even though we really don’t need one. Plus, $100 doesn’t really buy a TV (or at least not the ones he was looking at). Madison was being her normal hyper self running around looking at things until she saw the guitar hero bundle. Yes, that is my whole family playing Guitar Hero in Sears. Madison asked us if we could buy her the drums.
Now, the school district I live in has cut the art and music programs from the curriculum and will not be adding them back. I have written many posts on this blog about how awful I think this situation is and how I feel that music definitely is a class that should not be cut. My daughter loves to play instruments and sing. I can’t imagine depriving her of it. With the $100 Sears gift card, we will be able to fulfill her wish and give her the additional music support she will not be getting from our school. Who knows — Madison may end up to be talented singer, dancer, in a band, etc. However, I’d love to give her the stepping stones she needs to reach her full potential. (Plus, well, Guitar Hero is fun for mom and dad too. Dad was all over getting it when I told him there was 3 Tool songs and Freak On A Leash by Korn. I also need to add that the gift card paid for a portion of the cost of this bundle. I paid the rest.)
Since we got such an awesome family gift from Sears, I’d like to extend this awesome opportunity to one of my readers. Yes, I’d like to give you a $100 gift card to Sears to use however you like.
You can enter via blog comment, tweet or blog post:
Blog Comment:
I just need you to tell me what you think you’d want to spend your $100 on. Head on over to Sears and let me know the item number of what you like.
Twitter:
I’ve made it super easy for you to Twitter about this contest. Just tweet out this message:
RT @blm03 please grant my wish to win a $100 #Sears gift card – tweet to make your own wish: http://urlbrief.com/8e0599
Blog Post:
You can also enter by writing a post about the contest and linking back to this post. Make sure you leave a comment with the URL to your post, so I can count it as an entry.
Each tweet, comment or post counts as one registration. You can register up to three times by tweeting, leaving a comment, and doing a post on your blog. The winner will be chosen at random by IZEA based on all entries. This contest goes until December 23 at midnight EST. Good Luck!
Check out the other Izea Insiders for more chances to win:
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Granting Wishes at Sears
Tuesday, December 16th, 2008TThis post is sponsored, but the ideas, thoughts and ramblings are my own.
Since having kids, I turned into a big softie. Yes, I’ll actually admit it. I cry at things I never would have before, and I think about things that never would have crossed my mind before having kids. I’ll be honest here — I get all teary eyed at Sears new commercials. Their new campaign is about how one gift can change someone’s life. Since I absolutely love Ty Pennington, I thought I’d show you what he had to say:
Bill and I bundled the kids off early yesterday morning and headed off to Sears. I luck out since Sears is actually walking distance from my house, and we actually shop their quite a bit — off the top of my head, we got a bench, our snowblower, and our lawnmower from there. However, on this trip, we had no idea what we were going to get. My Christmas shopping is pretty much done, so we were going to try to find something for the kids.
Now, the school district I live in has cut the art and music programs from the curriculum and will not be adding them back. I have written many posts on this blog about how awful I think this situation is and how I feel that music definitely is a class that should not be cut. My daughter loves to play instruments and sing. I can’t imagine depriving her of it. With the $100 Sears gift card, we will be able to fulfill her wish and give her the additional music support she will not be getting from our school. Who knows — Madison may end up to be talented singer, dancer, in a band, etc. However, I’d love to give her the stepping stones she needs to reach her full potential. (Plus, well, Guitar Hero is fun for mom and dad too. Dad was all over getting it when I told him there was 3 Tool songs and Freak On A Leash by Korn. I also need to add that the gift card paid for a portion of the cost of this bundle. I paid the rest.)
Since we got such an awesome family gift from Sears, I’d like to extend this awesome opportunity to one of my readers. Yes, I’d like to give you a $100 gift card to Sears to use however you like.
You can enter via blog comment, tweet or blog post:
Blog Comment:
I just need you to tell me what you think you’d want to spend your $100 on. Head on over to Sears and let me know the item number of what you like.
Twitter:
I’ve made it super easy for you to Twitter about this contest. Just tweet out this message:
RT @blm03 please grant my wish to win a $100 #Sears gift card – tweet to make your own wish: http://urlbrief.com/8e0599
Blog Post:
You can also enter by writing a post about the contest and linking back to this post. Make sure you leave a comment with the URL to your post, so I can count it as an entry.
Each tweet, comment or post counts as one registration. You can register up to three times by tweeting, leaving a comment, and doing a post on your blog. The winner will be chosen at random by IZEA based on all entries. This contest goes until December 23 at midnight EST. Good Luck!
Check out the other Izea Insiders for more chances to win:
BenSpark
Steven Sanders
Corrin Renee
Elizabeth
Laurie
Kat
Heather
Brett
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