Camping weekend

So my boys went camping this weekend. Mark drove all the way up to Aberdeen, Washington to pick Jacob up from school. Boy was he excited. They went down to the Nehalem River for the camping. Jacob caught his first keeper fish. A rainbow trout. He of course wanted to keep it and take it home for it to be a pet! Cute huh? Mark had to explain to him the cycle of life and how he either had to throw it back or eat it. So he decided he wanted to eat it.... but he didn't like it. Can't blame him as I don't like trout either. So Mark eat most of it and threw the rest with the guts back into the river. I guess when Mark was gutting it Jacob went kind of white and said that was gross enough to make him throw up. But he didn't! I am glad they had a good time.
I got a nice quiet weekend, mostly. I got the cleaver idea that I wanted bangs.... so I cut me some bangs. WOOHOO, no more curly Q's as Mark likes to call them. Of course I went to go straighten them out with the big fat curling iron Danica gave me years ago and what do I do? BURN myself!!! Now I have this huge burn mark on my forehead. Of course that was the first thing Mark noticed when he got home after dropping Jacob off, was the burn not the bangs. I had to tell him that I had them before he even realized it. What a goof.
Tomorrow granted that I can get myself in gear I get the pleasure of going down to the DMV to get new tags, and to change my name on my title. OOOPS Yes I still have yet to do that even though it has been over a year since I changed my name. What can I say. I just hope they don't realize it!
Today I finally finished our mantel. Now today was the 3rd time I have had to sand this thing down! The first was because Mark didn't sand it enough so there was still paint in the grain. So I had to sand the whole thing. Then he fills in the wholes for the nails with wood filler stuff that is stainable. Well you aren't suppose to get it on the surface of the wood. He didn't read that. So where it soaked into the surface it left this big light spot when he stained it again. So yet again I have to sand it. This time it was only the sides and the bottom as there are no nails in the top. So I did that today. STUPID! It was so hot here I was sweating like a pig, and what do you get when you are sticky from sweating and you have sawdust flying everywhere? You get a person who looks like they were tared and than had sawdust dumped on them. It was gross. None the less I got it done, and I even stained it so it would be ready to put the poly coat over it in a few days. So oh my goodness after nearly 2 years of having the fireplace ripped apart and sitting there waiting to get done... it is almost there!!!!! So memory when you say that it takes Michael so long to do projects after starting them.... well there you go you aren't the only one that deals with that kind of thing. Most of our projects take forever. Heck we haven't even finished the patio yet... and that was 3 1/2 years ago. So sad. But I feel better now that it is almost done and that I won't have to worry about it anymore. Than we are going to have to have family dinner over here so everyone can see it since mostly nobody has.

Little bit of advice

My advice for the day is: Make sure you know what you are getting into. :) So we had people from Penguin windows come out and give a great spiel. We really liked their windows so we figured we would get them. Fortunately you have 3 business days to back out of the deal. Which of course we had to do because Mark realized that he didn't want to pay that much for them and that we can order ones almost as good and do it ourselves. That I am not much looking forward to! So we figured out, before Penguin windows came along, that we were going to take out a home equity loan so we can do the windows, siding, and the kitchen. Have it all done and not have to worry about it. Than we had the spiel with Penguin windows. Now mind you we were going to take out about 10 grand for all this. Well we wouldn't have been able to do anything but the windows if we did this because it was WELL over 10 grand. So now we are back to doing everything and doing it ourselves. Still not looking forward to that, but it would be nice to have everything done instead of paying for the next 10 years for windows. So make sure you look at different options before you make up your mind. It is never a bad idea to take the time out to compare to ALL of the competition.
The start of my school year has been very peaceful. I have finally gotten back to my cross stitching. I haven't worked on that in months. Feels good to get to it. All is well with us, both of us are doing good. Can't complain at the moment.

Meet thy doom

Let me tell you, today was the most hideous way to spend our last full day with Jacob. It was the most awful thing to experience. I spent most of the day crying because of it, so of course I have a gigantic headache. I just don't know what to do anymore. I couldn't believe the horrible stuff that came out of that kids mouth. I was totally appalled and horrified. This kid needs some serious help and everyone around him ignores that. Every time I bring it up everyone gets all defensive and cranky so that is the end of that topic. I don't know how to go about this anymore.
Last Friday we took the kids to a place called Discovery Village. It is so fun! It is a little science museum place. I think the kids would really like it. They took 4 old houses in Salem and fixed them up and put the displays in the houses. There is also a HUGE play structure. This thing is so massive! I think people should bring their kids here and let me take them there.
Mark's step mom Carol has cervical cancer. It thankfully is only in the first stage so they caught it wayyyyyyy early. She is going in on Tuesday to have it all taken out. His dad is a hole other story. That poor man. They are pretty sure that his walking and speech has something to do with a toxin. So they have done blood work, mri's all sorts of things and they can't find anything. The other day they did a spinal tap to check the fluid because there are some toxin's that aren't detected in anything but the spinal fluid. It just breaks my heart to see him going through this. He is on muscle relaxers that do little to nothing but he can barley walk without them. So we are all hoping that they find something this time and that it can be taken care of before anything gets worse. Also that everything is reversible.
Well we are taking Jacob back tomorrow for the school year. It so does not seem like it has been a whole summer yet. I just can't believe it. Shocking. So I got to get in bed and get some sleep because we have to leave early in the morning to drop him off and all that fun stuff.

pictures from vacation

Ok, so I got the pictures on the computer. Now because there are so many I of course can't put them all on, but there are a lot of them that I would like to share. So over the next few days I will add them so they aren't all at once.

The White Bangel tiger was just so cute scratching his log, made me think of my kitty. The one next to the tiger is a Apricot Skunk. Very rare I guess. Popular belief is that they are albino, not so. You can actually see their white strip. She was such a sweetheart. Than there is my pretty little panther. He was just so cute. Kind of look freaky in that picture though. Jacob and I got to pet the 18 month old Black Bear. He was pretty freaked out about it. I guess there is only 2 month in a year were they can have people pet the bears without them trying to eat people, wasn't that time of year so they had to distract her with a bottle. One of my favorite was this one with Jacob and the female Lion. She is just looking at him like he would be a great before dinner snack. Quiet funny.

home, home on the range

Well the rest of our vacation went pretty well. I got some great pictures at the West Coast Game Park. Oh my goodness it was so great. It totally wasn't for Jacob it was for me. It was so funny, before we went in, Mark leans over to Jacob and says, "Now you watch her face when she gets in there and you will understand how much she loves animals." So we walk in and Jacob's mouth drops and he says to Mark, "wow dad I always though she was just talking big when she talked about bringing all these animals home with her, but she is serious isn't she? She would really have all the animals she could bring home huh?" Set Mark into belly rolling laughter. Oh I just had so much fun. I got some great pictures too, but I haven't had the time to get them on the computer. So I will have to do that some time tomorrow and put some on here. They are great.
Friday Susan and I are taking the kids to Discovery Village. Get them wound up and tuckered out. Mark's dad comes into town on Friday evening, so we will have to go see him. Not sure if his step mom is coming this time or not. He has yet again more doctors appointments. Poor guy.
I love Craigs list. I have gotten rid of so much stuff from using that website. Today I sold a camcorder. Have had it for years and years and have used it twice maybe three times. Just silly. I am so tired of junk! I am on a clutter killing spree.

just a little grip

I can't believe it, just two weeks after I got called for Jury duty, and after them telling me that they can't call me again for 2 years, two weeks later they called me again. That is wrong with this picture. Mark and Memory have NEVER been called, and I am getting harrassed by them to go. HOW RUDE!

hardly surviving

So we are on our family's little outing. Man do I ever want to crawl into a cave with no light, no sound, no anything!!!!! I have finally found one of my migraine triggers. Strong scents. Maybe not all of them but there you go. Mark bought some insense the other week and left them in his car. We got in it to leave today and it was an almost instant migraine. By the time we got half way to our first destination I was feeling so sick that I had to pull over a few times because I thought I was going to throw up. Of course it has just gotten worse from there. Going to Oregon Coast Aquarium really didn't help at all. So here we are sitting at dads house with a terribly bored 7 year old, a 37 year old passed out on the futon and me wanting to go nuts because Mark wont wake up and take Jacob to Wal-mart to get a new movie so he can watch something. So I am going nuts because everything is getting out of hand waiting for Mark to get up. How that man can sleep so much and with so much noise is totally beyond me.
I must say though, we h ad a great time at Oregon Coast Aquarium. Jacob held my hand almost the whole time. He clung to me like cling wrap. Mark was pretty amazed by it too. Tomorrow should be interesting to see what happens. Tomorrow we are going down to West Coast Game Park Safari. I am way excited. I can't wait to see all those animals. Mark is scared that I am going to try and take them home. He is very worried about the Blank Panther.
So I am going to try to wake up the old man and try to get them to go out to find a movie.