Good grief (the efforts they will take to drive us nuts)

Weston is trying hard to get out of his schoolwork. It is a simple assignment. He looks at the different habitats and writes one reason why he would want to live there. He says it is too hard. he doesn’t want to live in any of those habitats.

I say, “Come on Weston, surely you can come up with a single good reason why living in the desert would be a good idea.”

Weston: “Ummmm. No. I can not. Why’da wanna live there? It has cactus to stab you. You would die of heatedness and you would get hot sand in your shoes. And what are you gonna eat? Big spiders?

Then he went on to explain that if the assignment was to say why he did not want to live in any of the environments it would be an easy one.

Grasslands: Oh, yuck. It’s all dewy, which makes it muddy. Where would you live? In the mud? What would you eat? MUD?

Jungle: This stuff is just crazy. No one wants to live there except naked people. That is why. Cause they have no clothes and can’t leave or people would make fun of them.

Arctic: Penguins? they want me to live like a penguin and eat yucky fish. No way. I do not want to die of blue freezing cold. No way would I live there. It would mean being a penguin or an icicle.

Woodlands: See. Another stupid one. Where ya gonna live? A tree? Would you even live? NO! You would get killed by an animal, animal, ANIMAL. Or by a bullet. I don't want to die, so I don’t want to live there and get killed by a hunter. What would I eat? Bullets? And double reasons, the animals WOULD EAT ME.

Frankly, if Weston moved to my neck of the woods, I would eat him too.


(This is his reasoning- word for word)

Duct tape and bobby pins. A must have for all new homes!

Funny story:

First night in our house we noticed that the bedroom door was locked, and could not be unlocked. It couldn't be unlocked from the inside- or the outside. "Don't close the door." we told each other.

That night, with kids tucked into bed, Dustan and I lie in our own bed, discussing the niceness of having our own place for the next few months. "I should check on the kids", he said.

Only, when he tried to do so, we found that we had forgotten and closed the door.

So. We were locked inside our room.

"We can climb out the window", I said.

"And what then?" said Dustan. "The house is locked up, the kids are upstairs and won't be able to hear us." (The doorbell is also broken)

"Well, we have to do SOMETHING".

"No kidding. I will try to take the door off the hinges."

Unfortunately for us, the door hinges had been painted, and that didn't work.
Neither did using a credit card on the latch.
Neither did trying to remove the doorknob (we were prepared to unscrew the thing with our fingernails)- only, there were no outside screws.

So, in a state of hysteria, we considered kicking the door in. We live in a duplex, and it was almost midnight. I was worried about waking the neighbors, but what could we do?

If only we could pull that latch in. If only... (If only we hadn't closed the dang door!!!!!)

And so, I looked for anything I could use. I considered my hair, but how would I get it wrapped around the latch? I needed something stiffer. Maybe I had a piece of jewelry that would work?

And there, in my jewelry basket was the answer. A bobby pin. So out of place, and so ready to be unfolded and twisted into a hook.

After a couple of tries we were free! And fortunately maintained a good sense of humor throughout the entire thing. It took the rental agency a few days to fix the problem. meanwhile, duct tape kept it from happening again.

Toasty-Toes mansion has become Toasty-Toes cottage

...or to be more accurate, it's a duplex. But it's lovely, and it's private, and for however long it takes us to fly away to Ecuador, it's mine. Living with friends was a wonderful-fun adventure. But six months is a long time, and I think we are all happy to have some space to roll around in and call our own.

Not to mention, I can homemake and decorate, and tell you all about it. Fun for me- fun for you.

What I can't do is play Blogger on the internet because the internet I have hardly works. I can't really complain, because, it's not mine.

So, look here for some sporadic posting. Unless of course, I take better advantage of the free wi-fi at the city park (whose internet I suspect I can almost pick up at the house), and post more often. The kids would love that. Fresh air, swings, and a great battlefield for Nerf wars.

Okay, now for the good stuff (at least for my curious family), here are some Living room pics. I still need to hang some art work and I have another chair that will be moved in. I love it. Oh, and right now it doubles as a dining room because as of this morning the dining room table was still in pieces.





Don't you just love Heidi girl's morning routine? Stretch girly, stretch!