Wow two months since I last wrote a blog. The time has just flown right by!! I hope everyone has safe and happy holidays. We certainly did!!! Well I guess since it has been so long I will have to go back and summarize what has been going with us.
November- WOW, changes started brewing for Tim and I with our jobs. I can sum it up now for you by saying: we still have jobs, collect pay checks weekly (though not as much as before), have a roof over our heads, warm food in our bellies, and clothes on our backs. Considering the status of the country but mostly the state of Michigan we are extremely lucky (for now)!! I also won tickets to see Sesame Street Live in Flint at the beginning of the month. We had a blast!!!! We had third row seats and got backstage passes to meet Zoey (Elmo's friend). Thanksgiving came and went way too quickly. It was nice to have a long weekend but I bravely (and foolishly) ventured out on Black Friday for the first time. Oh yea forgot to mention I went alone too. Idiot, idiot, idiot!!! I will never go again and if for some stupid reason I decide to try again I WILL have at least one other person with me. I do give myself a pat on the back though and I'm sure most of you will too when you hear this: I went to Toys R Us!!!!! Yup, that's right Toys R Us!! If ever you want to experience Black Friday to the fullest, go there. Anyone at this point who can't even begin to imagine what I went through, try this little trick: go to a Toys R Us on a Saturday afternoon, walk around and take it all in, walk back out to your car, close your eyes and picture that times 5000!!!! No joke 5000, that was not a typo. If after that image has faded and your hair has grown back you will have just experienced the surface of it. Thanksgiving weekend Kenzie celebrated her first of six Christmases this year.
December- A bit more normal of a month for us. I successfully made it thru the whole holiday season without baking or decorating one single cookie (though I enjoyed eating plenty)!!!! We had acquired an older snow blower from Tim's grandma so we were really excited to get some snow and try it out. Well after a few new parts and a lot of Tim's time he got it up and running. Here's what we discovered: snow blowers are very nice and quickly move snow out of your way without straining your back shoveling; a little snow blower only can handle a normal snow fall not a CRAP LOAD; and finally, if the snow blower only blows the snow up X inches tall and the snow piles are X+ inches tall, the snow coming out of the snow blower does not go over the piles but lands just in front of it leaving lots of heavy snow that you have to shovel out of the way anyway. For my cold weather friends who get this, feel free to pass these little wisdoms on. For my warm weather friends who don't get this, bless your innocence!! At the beginning of the month Kenzie started exhibiting some unusual behavior after being gone to Grand Rapids for two weekends in a row. At first we assumed it was normal acting out as she adjusted back to our routine but as the days went on she was acting worse. At its worst we were averaging 2 hours of sleep a night, and Kenzie would throw herself at doors and windows if I had to go out to start the car in the morning or use the bathroom. Her behavior at school started changing too, I became scared that she would get hurt during one of her 'fits', or I would get hurt at work or in the car from over-exhaustion. We have now figured out that Mackenzie is suffering from extreme separation anxiety. A family friend recommended a counseling office and we look forward to our meetings to be able to 'talk about all our feelings'. She is doing a lot better now but we are not out of the woods quite yet. The weekend before Christmas Kenzie was in Grand Rapids to celebrate Christmas with her dad and his family (# 2). The week of Christmas Kenzie got to take a break from school to enjoy some much overdue time with Nana. Also Tim and I got the 24th thru the rest of the week off so we enjoyed a nice long weekend all together. Christmas this year was wonderful!!! This was the first year since Kenzie was a baby that she was actually home with me. Christmas Eve we went to Tim's parent's house for dinner and presents (# 3).When we got home we put the reindeer food (oats and glitter) out in the yard, set out some milk and cookies for Santa, and opened Mommy's traditional Christmas Eve present ( I always get all of us a new set of pjs). Christmas morning Kenzie woke up at 8:30, Tim and I were actually up before her. We went down stairs to see what Santa had brought (# 4). Every year it gets more and more fun watching her open presents and this year was no exception. And of course the animals were part of the show too. Roxy paced around until we finally opened her new 'baby' and Akasha 'helped' Tim put all the wrapping paper in a trash bag. After presents we enjoyed yummy homemade cinnamon rolls courtesy of Grandma Kathy (Tim's mom)!! Then Papa came over with more presents (# 5). By 11 am Kenzie had had enough, she just wanted the day to be done and was ready for bed. Needless to say we had a quiet afternoon. Later we went to Nana's house (# 6, yea the last one!!). We opened presents, ate dinner, then watched Kenzie's new movie, 'Alvin and the Chipmunks' (btw- very cute movie). We spent the rest of the week and weekend playing with all the new toys Mackenzie got. Her new favorite activity is playing board games. She got 5 or 6 new ones and we have had a blast playing with all of them. The week of New Year's Kenzie again was out of school and spent the days at Nana's torturing, I mean cuddling, Smokey. Tim also had this whole week off work and so it was time for him to finish the basement. This has been an ongoing project for the last three years. He has worked on it a bit at a time when he has the extra time and money to put into it. The original goal was to have it completed for a party on New Year's Eve but we decided that probably wasn't a good idea since Kenzie would be home. So New Years Eve we made no special plans to go out. After Tim's over-explanation of what New Year's was and how and why it's celebrated Kenzie decided midnight was just WAY TOO LATE to stay up so she crashed about 9:30. I actually stayed up to midnight but not much after and enjoyed 2 beers (woo hoo, party woman, I know). It felt good really good to not have to worry about driving anywhere and feeling like hell the next morning. Wow I just sounded so responsible and stuff. Crazy, huh? Wait at the begginning of this paragraph I think I said 'normal', yup, ok I would like to strick that word from the record.
January- As of Friday the 2nd, our basement is considered finished!!!!!! We did it, we actually did it. Ok wait, correction. Tim did it, he actually did it!!! I have to give him full credit for this one, although I did help out quite a bit. During this whole process I marveled at Tim's ability to think and plan ahead and to see the whole picture. He has never been trained how to do the things he did yet somehow he can just picture it and it comes out right. The only bad thing that came out of this is that we now know I am very allergic to the dry wall dust and have been suffering for the past month since every time the furnace turns on it kicks the dust through the whole house. So Friday and Saturday while Kenzie was in Grand Rapids we cleaned the whole house top to bottom, well bottom to top. Tim was on a mission in the basement to get all the dust cleaned up and everything put back into place (he missed his big HD tv). I concentrated on the rest of the house. Everything isn't finished yet but it is getting there and at least the dust is under control now. Kenzie got home late Sunday night so she hasn't even gotten a chance to see what we did to the basement so I am excited to show her. Monday morning (the 5th) was her first day back to school in two weeks so she was pretty excited to see her friends again. As you can imagine we were running a bit late this morning and so were rushing to get out the door. On our way out to the truck Kenzie caught her boot on the only bit of snow/ice on our whole sidewalk and down she went. I was right behind her so I helped her up and she was crying but had her back to me. When she turned around she was holding her mouth, I couldn't see anything since it's still dark at 7:30 in the morning. All I could do was think the worst as I carried her back into the house, 'great, a missing tooth or a split chin/lip'. Tim had just gotten home from work so while I grabbed some ice while he was got the bandages. Luckily once I got her in the light and peeled her hands off her face it really wasn't too bad: a skinned knee, a scratched up nose and cheek, and a fat upper lip. Once we applied the boo-boo cream and band-aids the tears were almost gone. Singing to her ABC songs c.d. at the top of her lungs all the way to school seemed to be the final cure. So good news everyone, she will live..... to do it again I'm sure.
Next blog will hopefully be a catch up of pictures.
.JPG)
