Struggling

I really wanted to write a post all week, but just wasn't sure what to write about. It seems as though nothing terribly exciting is happening in our daily lives, and on top of that I'm struggling with lots and lots of emotions. A great deal of it, I know, has to do with the time of year. I've ALWAYS struggled with the dark, cold days this time of year, and I'm finding that being alone at home all day doesn't help at all. That's another issue, I haven't worked in weeks, and I'm just so sad about it. I don't really know what is happening with the subbing. All-in-all, I just wanted to check in and update that the kids are doing great, and that things are going along without any major bumps in life right now, and for that I'm very grateful!

Going to the Super Bowl!

Pittsburgh prevailed in a great game last night. We were also rooting for Green Bay, so we are very pleased with the results of yesterday's games. With our new HDTV, I even got to see my in-laws on TV! They have really great season tickets and I looked up and there they were! The younger two made it to half time, and JR made it to the beginning of the fourth quarter. Hopefully the later bedtimes don't come back to bite us today. We are all excited though, and looking forward to the big game in a few weeks!

Here we go!

Only about five hours until the big Steelers game today! We are all dressed appropriately, and my husband has gone to pick up the oven bake pizza that we will be having for dinner this evening. We are very disappointed that our game is the later of the two and the little ones, who are the bigger fans than the oldest, won't be able to even dream of staying up until the end. It will be very nice though, to be able to watch it on our new, large, HDTV. Very hopeful that the Steelers will be bringing home a victory and will be headed to the Super Bowl in two weeks!

Home again!

Everyone is home today for another snow day. Both of our schools went on a 2 hour delay fairly early last night, but I was noticing that major metropolitan school districts had gone straight to closing fairly early last evening. I was about 95% certain we were all going to be home again today. Even though it means going longer at the end of the year, we were kind of rooting for it. Yesterday we played some Monopoly and watched movies as a family, and of course my dear husband made everyone a nice hot breakfast. We also got some cleaning and other projects done, so today can really be a carefree day as we head into the weekend. The one downside to this is that we aren't able to go visit my in-laws this weekend like we had planned, but we've already filled the weekend with other fun plans. We are all happy to be home!

Snowing again

We are all home from school today. I'll be honest, I really enjoy snow days, as long as both my kids and my wonderful husband are home. He's always had a tradition of taking the kids to the local diner for breakfast on a "joint" snow day, but since we are really tightening our budget, he's decided to make eggs and waffles at home. It's supposed to snow all day and into the evening, and then the wind is going to pick up and start blowing. Blowing snow is never a good thing in our district, so we'll just have to wait and see what tomorrow brings.

Our furniture rearranging is pretty much done. Last evening my husband went and picked up our Christmas/anniversary gift from my in-laws...a 42" TV. It's a very nice TV, but almost ridiculously large. The kids are excited about it, but because of where it is it currently only receives the over-the-air signal. That's pretty much all we watch in the evenings this time of year, and most importantly, we'll be able to pull in the Steelers game on Sunday!

Up for sale

Our family is up at my dad's place at the lake. This is an emotional trip...the first one since it was decided that the cottage has to be sold. I had known for a month, but with the holidays and other things I basically just didn't think about it. Dad just can't afford to keep it with his rising health care costs due to his illness, and he is less physically able to enjoy it as well. My wonderful husband and I had hoped to be able to purchase it when this time came, but were hoping it would be in another couple of years. We just can't swing it right now...not even close. We finally told the kids this week because I knew the "for sale" sign would be up when we got here. JR especially took it hard...this place has been so much fun for our family, with so many, so many good memories. JR had reached the age where he was old enough to go to the end of the road and fish for hours by himself. We just came up this morning after Sunday School, and Dad only stayed long enough to have lunch. I can tell he's not feeling well, and that adds to my emotional state. I'm trying so hard to relax and have fun, and to enjoy it while I can!

Purge Fest

Last week, when JC was sick and I was taking down Christmas decorations, we decided to do some major rearranging in our house. I'd had a thought for a while that if we could just get another little sitting area in our dining room, our lives would be so much more functional. Since things were a mess anyway, and we really wanted the boys to stay quiet while JC was resting last week, we decided to move our loveseat from the living room into our dining room, which required us rotating the dining room table 90 degrees and moving it into one side of the room. We actually like the way the dining room table looks, and there was already a TV set up on top of our computer desk, so we were able to watch football in comfort and the boys were entertained by a movie in the living room. By removing the loveseat from our living room, we were able to totally rearrange the living room furniture, and we decided to move our computer desk into a corner of the living room. That left us with nothing for the TV to sit on in the dining room, so yesterday we were off to by a TV stand (and I LOVE the one that we purchased) and had already been planning to buy a new loveseat so that will be delivered in February. In the process of moving the computer desk and other various pieces of furniture, we've doing some MAJOR purging of junk that we no longer want/need. We even decided last night to defrost the basement freezer so that everything was getting a fresh start. Of course, the downside is that with not being able to do everything in one day, we've been living in chaos for a week, and I've also realized today that I'm not completely happy with how everything is currently arranged, so there is more unloading of shelves, moving furniture, and reloading the shelves happening today. Our goal is to have things at least somewhat arranged enough to watch the Steelers game at 4:30. Go Steelers!