Oyiiii What a mess!

If you've been around me lately you probably know I'm on a cleaning kick.  It's time to get rid of stuff we don't use and need.  It's time to organize.  I have donated about 15 boxes to our local thrift shop and sent 5 bags of garbage out to the dumpster.  We had a few boxes that suffered water damage last spring and I finally went through them.  Boxes of broken down cardboard went out to recycling.  I have made some great progress.  It feels amazing.  I have been ignoring my office.

It just felt so overwhelming.  I started by pulling out the random toys that had somehow made it into the pile,  I shelved a couple boxes of books and pulled out unnecessary empty Usborne Boxes.  I went through 2 boxes of misc stuff that had been piled from the table. I also re-arranged the furniture slightly.  I really want to paint and sew new curtains.

I love the printed literature that Usborne has available for us.  It's professional and fairly cheap to purchase.  They update it from time-to-time so I had outdated material that I went through and recycled.  What an amazing feeling.  I'm not done yet but I have definitely made some progress. Watch for more updates on that.

Where is your trouble area?  Do you have a spot that collects junk?  Which is your favorite thrift shop to donate to?  Love to hear your comments!!

Make my heart swell!

The new January Titles that Usborne Books & More is offering make me so happy.  I am twitter-patted!  My heart swell!

I just received a new box of these great titles.  BHH (Book Hauling Husband) and I created this great little video for you.  Don't look at the Vacuum in the back ground or all the extra mess around the house. :)  I'm still using the holidays as my excuse.

For your viewing pleasure:

Have a fabulous Tuesday!!

Re-entry

Wow.  Back to reality.  Re-entry is a great way to describe it all.  I had a little big of Holiday Hangover last week.  I worked so hard to get the perfect Christmas gifts for my kids and did the necessary baking and decorating.  I felt like... "Now what?!"  I've had a little time to come back to normal and I'm ok with that. 

I saw some posts on Facebook about the kids going back to school.  Reality is that my  little two don't go back until Monday, January 7th.  Nick goes back today and isn't thrilled about going while his brother and sister play around the house and sleep in.  I know deep inside he knows this is best though.  Back to his routine, friends and basketball.

I really need routine too.  It's time to open the book store again.  I have a brand new calendar that is begging to be written in.  I just need to find it first.  I love having events that I do every year and that I can count on to fill the empty calendar.  It is definitely time to start to fill it with new events though.  I have a book fair in Madelia to wrap up and a lot of other great projects to get going.  I want to contact area Youth Groups about Cards for a Cause.  I want to begin reading at Preschools and Daycares.  I want to approach additional schools about book fairs and Reach for the Stars.  I want to talk to other area Libraries about Literacy for Lifetime and introduce them to our wonderful books. 

I am expecting a box of new titles to arrive in the next few days.  I believe they shipped from Tulsa last Friday, the 28th.  I think they'll arrive tomorrow.  it's always so exciting to see the new titles.  I always think of my favorite customer when I see a topic that I know they will enjoy.  I know Grant and Camden will love the new Dino Sticker books.  My friend Nolan will love the new Sticker Dressing books.  He has almost all of them.  Most Sticker Dolly Dressing books for the little girls in my life.  New Doodle Tins will be exciting!!  Pictures to follow I promise!!

Right now I feel a little like this:

It is time to sit down with paper and pen and make some goals and write out a plan.  First thing to do is text my dear hubby and ask if he'll take down the Christmas Tree.  Tonight we will put the living room back in order.  He is such a great help.  We spent a chunk of time Saturday and Sunday cleaning in our basement.  We moved when I was pregnant and then had Amanda shortly after.  A lot of boxes were shoved hap-hazardly in the basement and we never took the time to go through them.  We are working diligently to get it cleaned up now.  We have made some enormous progress.  I will now have a functioning Craft Storage/work area and the kids will have a play area.  I plan to get a carpet remnant and some bean bag chairs for them to hang out in.  Amanda's play kitchen and some of their toys will come down there.  The storage room will now be organized and we'll be able to find things.  Here is the beginning of my craft area.  You couldn't get within 3 feet of this cabinet when we started.  the stuff was piled pretty high.  We have made great progress!!  Love eating frogs.

John has hauled 10 boxes of stuff to the thrift shop and 5 bags of garbage to the dumpster.  Not to mention the ton of boxes he hauled to recycling with magazines and broken down boxes.  I had a shoebox hoarding issue.  I think we broke down about 20 shoe boxes.  We will keep working on this project until it is done. The kids are quite excited about having a new play area so they keep me motivated to work on it.  I will update you as our progress continues.

What are you working on?  Leave me a note in the comments.  I'd love to hear from you!!

Snow Day TGIF

TGIF Babe!  It's finally Friday.  I am so excited.  I'm kind of in a kick-butt-take-names kind of mood.  I have accomplished some great things at work already this morning.  I also call it Eating Frogs. Feels so good to check things off the list.  There are 5 new computers sitting next to my desk.  I'll be tackling one or two of them next. 


Last week John and I went out to Shells Brewery to pick up a few Christmas Gifts.  It is beautifully decorated for the holidays.  I had never been in the store before.  It is very nice and more reasonably priced than I anticipated.

The Famous Peacocks!

I don't have a lot of specific plans for the weekend.  I am hoping to get a few projects done around the house.  John and I are working on some organizing in the basement.  The kids have so many toys and are big enough now to play down there without supervision.  We're hoping to have it somewhat set up by the end of the weekend.  I might have to go shopping for an area rug or carpet remnant.  Maybe some bean bag chairs.  Something to make it nice and cozy and inviting. 

Visit the Armory Shop

Jacob is in his 3rd year of Cub Scouts and enjoys it for the most part.  His leader does a great job getting tours and projects lined up for them.  Recently they had a tour of the Armory Shop in New Ulm.  John had to work the day of this tour so I took off work a little early and took him.  If this had been just a normal meeting we might have skipped it but I thought this tour would really interest him.  I have to admit it held my attention too!

Officer Dahl gave us a great tour of the shop and trucks that had just came in from Hutchinson.  They were inside the shop and were thawing from the latest snowfall.  The boys got to go inside and could see the thick bullet proof glass.  Dahl showed them where their big GPS units would go and the Communication Radio's were going to be installed.

I didn't make notes but I believe he said there were 11 guys that were working in this shop right now.  Usually a few less but because of the current deployment it was a few more than normal.

Jacob checking out the inside of the Hummer!

What a Goof!

Lock and Load!

Check this out!

Jacob and Office Dahl

Awesome Snowmobile!

What are these for?

Tank!

How the Army carries water.

What goes in here?

What is the difference between the Brown and the Green?  Such great questions they had!

Where these in a war?  Nope.  For training purposes only! 

A lot of the equipment we saw is used at Fort Ripley near Little Falls, MN.  It was a very interesting trip.  The boys were pretty good listeners with a few reminders not to climb on the equipment. 

I am looking forward to sitting down and reading some of our Discovery Adventure Series books with Jacob.  I think the Tanks one will be a perfect fit for this topic!!

A Visitor for the weekend

We were very excited to hear our friend Jenny was coming for a visit this last weekend.  We don't get to see her often enough.  She made the trek over from Sommerset, WI, and stayed for the whole weekend.  The kids were so excited to see her.  Especially when they realized she brought presents.  She brought Jacob a Volcano kit and Amanda a Bracelet making kit. 

Friday night we went out to Carl's Corner in Beautiful Downtown Essig for supper.  It was very nummy and great to sit and visit.  We get such great service and food out there.  It was fun to introduce Jenny to one of our favorite places.

Saturday Jenny, the kids and I did a bunch of shopping in Mankato.  We got to see Grandma and finished up our shopping.  Saturday night Jenny and I went down and met up with her friend Al.  It was great to visit and relax while doing some people watching.

Jenny and Al

Crazy Book Lady

I will try to write up some more details about our Christmas and share some pictures soon.  We had a great time and the kids received many wonderful gifts.  Hope you had a wonderful time with your families also.

New Camera for me please!

I broke down and bought myself a new camera last night.  I love technology. (Remember, I'm a geek!)  Especially cameras.  I bought the Nikon 1.  I chose the white one.  I think it's very sleek and sexy.   My old camera wasn't zooming in/out anymore correctly and the lens reaction time was terribly slow.  I'm going to do some checking and see if there are any warranty left on it.  I think I only had it 18 months.  Anyways.... on to bigger and better!

I did a little research before hand and this was a great informational video I found. I like that it is set up for inexperienced photographers.  I don't know how to use a lot of the fancy features.   I'm hoping to test it out this weekend and see what I think.  I have a tripod and am hoping this will mount on there as well.  I have some more of the manual to read tonight.

What kind of a camera do you have?  What specific features do you look for?  I take a lot of action pictures so this camera has to react fast.  The specifications from the website state it can take 10 frames per second.  Hopefully that will work well for pictures of Nick at Basket ball.  He just rolls his eyes when he catches me taking his picture.  Some day he will appreciate these.

Speaking of Nick.  He is a Sophmore already.  Can you believe that!  Before I know it we'll be planning a graduation party for him.  Can you imagine!?!  I'm thinking it's time to get started organizing some albums so that I'm not down to the wire and in a time crunch.  The pictures below were taken with my iPhone.  Not great quality but better than nothing.

Nick's All Conference Team 2012 (Nick is in the Back Middle)

All Conference Team as they were announced at the opening of the tournament!