Oh MY!

So in the car tonight, Sari says, "I. Have. a. Boyfriend." Just like that...pauses after each word for emphasis. So I say, "You mean you have a boy who is a friend" and she says, "No. I. Have. a. Boyfriend. Do you want to know who it is?"
So I bite. "Who is it?"
"Dough"
"Who???"
"Dough"
"You mean JOE?"
"Yeah, but don't tell him...it's a secret."

I think we'll be starting modesty and PURITY training early with that one.

Watch out Aunt Fanny...my girl's after your boy. Oh, and Presley and CG better keep their girls out of Sari's way...she's quite intent on this, LOL.

Private Pity Party

Okay, I really want to stop the not-so-positive blogs, but today the hubs came home and said that starting Aug. 1st, our health insurance deductible, which is currently MET IN FULL, will be going up by another $1200 a year. Starting then. Meaning we will have to shell out another $1200 out of pocket before it is met for the rest of this year. Oh, and then in Jan. we will start over with having to meet the full $4200. All this AND they aren't paying him a cent beyond the insurance coverage. Time to look for other solutions. I can't imagine how much it costs them a month to provide us with what is basically now catastrophic coverage, but I think I'd rather they just pay him the money.
On a side note, I guess that's a prompt from God to look at the dietary ways to relieve my pains since the meds that make me functional (and allowed for our cross-country trek) cost hundreds of dollars we don't have every month (although they currently cost us nothing since the deductible is currently met).
And just when I was getting used to living like normal people live...
Sorry, not meaning to whine. I just have to vent and then I'll get past it and see God's hand in it.
But for now I'm working my way to considering it all joy ;-).

Really really random thoughts

• My root canal worked and I can chew on that side of my mouth for the first time in 5 years with NO PAIN!
  
• Vacation was wonderful. We saw sooo many things and people. I WILL blog about it all, but not tonight.
• I've been a recluse since getting back. I'm fighting an allergy/cold thing and I am just dead tired.
• I've also been a recluse because I am feeling like God is calling me to be home. Really home. Not "running around all the time and calling myself a stay at home mom" type home, but the real "I can make homemade bread and not worry about whether I'll be home when it needs to be punched down or go in the oven" type home. I'm trying to figure out what that looks like.
• And I've been a recluse because the thing I love most about being on vacation is the utter lack of connectedness with the frenetic pace of the outside world. In the Finger Lakes, life is just slower and I love it. It is balm to my soul. I'm trying to preserve that feeling a bit.
• And did I mention I'd dead tired?
• Oh, and we're poor.
• I'm thinking God may also be calling me to a business opportunity. I know that seems to run contrary to the above statements, and I don't think it's an immediate sort of thing, but it is the sort of thing I can do with the kids helping out...I'm just terrified of the potential "lose your shirt" risk that goes with starting a business.
• Did I mention we are already poor? So why not start a business?
  
• I don't want to hear about Michael Jackson again for a very long time.
  

Okay, that's it for now. I have to go cut up a peach for my son.

VACATION

Is there any better word in the dictionary than that one? We leave tomorrow, and I'm sooooo excited. I look forward to blogging when I return. In fact, I hope to blog with much better reliability ;-). See you real soon!

There's a light at the end of the pain tunnel

Well, at least one source of pain. My CROWN. Did you know it has literally been bothering me for 60 months...that's FIVE YEARS. I've had 3 different crowns on that tooth. And still never been free from pain. Well, I went back to the dentist yesterday for my weekly visit (you think I'm kidding, but I'm not) and I told him I was sooooo over the pain, he could pull the tooth for all I care. He went for something less drastic...a root canal. I guess it's not really wise to pull the tooth as it's the very back one and it holds all my other teeth in place...but let's review the cost. A pulled tooth? Well, my son's were about $100 a pop. A root canal? Add another zero. Seriously. $1000 if I go out of network, which is where they wanted to send me. Of course, there's no in network provider within a 30 mile radius, but I found one just beyond that and it will probably run me around $400. Yep, that's a $600 savings, so needless to say I'm going in network. We currently don't have two pennies to rub together, but I'm going to use money from the refi and pay for this root canal over the next 15 years...that's how desperate I am. Pain stinks...pain in your head stinks even more. Oh, to eat anything at any temperature and not have it cause me excruciating pain. Oh, to chew on the right side of my mouth. Who knew I'd ever be looking forward to a root canal? Friday can't come soon enough!

With apologies to T..S. Elliot

The bathing of cats is a difficult matter
it isn't at all like a virtual game.
It may seem to you I'm as mad as a hatter
when I say kittens' claws were created to MAME.

So why bathe them at all? Well, someone is coming to look at the boy kittens today, and I want them to be flea free. And Princess? Well that's another story and a whole different blog post. Stay tuned later for that one...
Oh, and if YOU need to bathe a kitten (they are too little for conventional flea products) I highly recommend Dr. Bronner's Peppermint soap. Peppermint kills the fleas on contact, and this soap is safe for a million uses, one of them being bathing animals. We used it on our dog when he was a puppy too. Just keep it away from their eyes. Peppermint vapors can irritate the eyes.

Here's a money saving tip...

Okay, yes, in hindsight I should have scooped this BEFORE I took the picture, but here's the tip anyway. As you may know, we had two unplanned litters of kittens show up at our house in the past three months. Kittens need a very shallow litter box because they are little and it needs to be easy for them to get in an out of. Cats, of course, need much deeper litter boxes because they "dig" and "bury" with more, shall we say, vigor. "Litterboxes" are expensive. Some are break-the-bank expensive (the self cleaning ones are close to $100). And why spend a bunch of money on on for kittens when they don't need it for very long? So here's a tip I got off a website (I'd tell you which one if I could only remember). Use plastic storage containers. Really. I mean, plastic is plastic. The one above cost me $3. And it's perfect. Plus, if you are really cheap (even I wouldn't go this far) you could bleach it and then reuse it in your home for storage as it has a lid too.
So there you go. Hope that helps someone out there. Oh, and did I mention that I have FREE KITTENS in need of a good home? Please pray that the lady coming today takes one...or maybe two. She wants a boy and I have tow so pray she can't decide and takes them both, LOL.