What are you up to today? This week?

[heidiiiii]

Okay Judi but dont keep us in suspense too long!

Ahhh. The simple pleasure of a bowl of Malt O Meal, soy milk, and brown sugar. We are going back to basics in the house lately. First it was an oatmeal jag, then grits (still love those!), now Malt O Meal..I would say Cream of Wheat would be next but it kind of the same as MoM. Every morning in the fall and winter, I had some form of hot cereal for breakfast before school.

[AmyD]

I get to do the grocery shopping today. Oh boy. It seems that the cost of food keeps going higher and higher. Gotta eat so what are you going to do. I went through all the coupons today and there's only a couple that I can use. The one good thing is I get to go to Michael's and I do have a 40% off coupon. This will take up most of my day and there's not much on TV tonight so I think I'll try to make a mini marble or granite countertop. Wish me luck.

[Sherry]

Had to teach again today, so haven't done much this afternoon. Got a pot of vegetable beef soup cooking, it'll make us two meals anyway. An old friend is coming to spend the weekend and he's in a chair, so I need to rearrange some things for him before Friday. can't wait to see him, but he and DH will sit and watch sports on tv all weekend!

[TinyJudi]

I will try not to keep you guys waiting. I can tell you of the conversation I had with my son, however and let you draw your own conclusions. Here we go...

Mom: Hey Andrew, I am thinking about building another Orchid and making it a bunny house. What do you think?

Andrew: Nice. How about a dollhouse with the Addams Family theme?

Mom: Oooohhh that would be cool. I could do that.

Andrew: Well, just so you know, I am ordering you a house to build and use the Addams Family theme. (He begins to rattle off ideas, which are staying a secret The kid had some good ones too!)

Mom: Which house?

Andrew: Well I am not gonna tell ya that MOM! I will say that it is the house that is recommended for that theme.

Mom: (Opening a second tab and googling Addams Family dollhouse...jaw dropping to the floor...beginning to hyperventilate...gathering composure) <very calmly saying> Oh, ok. I will let it be a surprise.

Andrew: Well I gotta go.....

So ya'll, do what I did and google it. You may already know which house it is.

[heidiiiii]

Oh Judi!! I sure hope you get what I got when i googled that. Big house! Lots of possibilities. When does it come?

[havanaholly]

We got home late yesterday afternoon and I finished unloading stuff this AM. The weather was fantastically crappy the whole time; billybedamned cold Thursday afternoon & Friday; we shopped Thursday afternoon in Milton and hiked all over the State Park & adjacent section of the Florida Trail on Friday. Friday night the GA paddlers showed up and were planning to paddle Tyty Creek Saturday; it began to rain late Friday night and coming down hard enough Saturday that not only did no one go paddling. the water in the Blackwater River (that flows close enough to the state park there's a beach to go swimming when the weather's warm & the river's not too fast or deep) was starting to rise, visibly. DH & I headed for Crestview to shop the neat thrift stores there and then down to Valparaiso to spend the rest of the day at the Aif Force Armament Museum. Most of the really neat aircraft are outside and it was just too cold and damp to stay outside (although I huddled under the SR17 and took it ALL in!).

Sunday it stopped raining and DH took off with the Georgia paddling crew to paddle Turkey Creek into Niceville. Between the sinus crud I'd fought for the past ten days plus the cold & damp putting me on my cane when I wanted to walk, I opted to stay in our warm, dry travel trailer & stitch the 1:24 prayer rug.

Monday the group wanted to paddle the Blackwater River. By then the water was just over the road on the approach to the Deaton Bridge just to the South of the park; we wished them happy paddling and a safe trip back to Georgia and we went to spend the day at all the thrift stores we could find in Pensacola. I found two Barbie scale Oriental tents at a Good Will plus three ethnic Barbies to rehab, and DH found me a string of super-neat unusual beads at a charity thrift store we hadn't shopped in before. The highlight was a bento box lunch at a Japanese cafe we'd discovered last year during DH's 50th HS reunion.

I have a couple of more things to finish painting and I think I'll be ready to start assembling the iso Fairfield!

[TinyJudi]

Chilly raining day here at home. Good day to stay inside and mini. Not sure when the house will arrive. My son told me he would let me know when he ordered it. I sent him a link to a place where he can't get it for less $$. I feel guilty about him spending so much.

[Syphon79]

Am at the office, but looking forward to leaving at 2:30 pm.

Hoping to

1) Get groceries done after work -- realized this morning we don't have milk or cereal or even ice cream (last one's most important!)

2) Have flowers ordered to be delivered to my mother's office tomorrow (she turns 57 on Saturday)

3) Maybe order some items at Dollhouse Emporium (need more modern pieces and wallpaper)

4) Clean the pet ratties' cages and set up our 'quarantine cage' -- BF and I got a call from the animal shelter giving us the go to adopt a female rat that was abandoned. We're very excited -- our girls are getting older and they need a baby sister to groom and spoil.

5) Hopefully, get the dining area ready for the next dollhouse build (Rye vs Winston vs Newport Cape)

[sammy]

Hot hot hot!!!!

Being seven months pregnant, stepmom for two kids at 10 and 12, and this heat!!! I am totally exhausted.

Oh, and I saved the kids' pet rat from being eaten by my cat.. But I am just glad the cat is staying away from my dollhouse, she seems to want to move in there....

[KathieB]

Wow, sammy ... sounds like your plate is full!

I'm heading off to get my hair cut this morning. I missed a couple of appointments in December and am in dire need!

Am hoping the last HBS order will get here today with the baseboards for the quilt shop. I'm in painting mode and would love to get them all painted today.

Had a nice dinner at Applebee's last night ... a sort of early birthday dinner. They've changed their menu. I had the Asiago Peppercorn steak ... it was marvelous, and I'm picky about steak.

[havanaholly]

Mammogram today and dexa, which is a radiology test to check the density of my bones and see how my osteoporosis is advancing/ is it time to start bone replacement Rx? We shall see... At least the doctor we have now doesn't think women like me who are 20+ years post-hysterectomy need to have annual Pap tests. Afterwards we went to lunch and stopped at Harbor Freight to see if they had DH's compresssor he had a rain check for the past four or five or six months (two had just come in). Then we stopped at the grocery store on the way home so I could pick up the last three ingredients I need to make him some Low Country Boil tomorrow night.

[woodland_miniatures]

Goodness, the Low Country Boil is just like what I made last night, except instead of green beans I used Savoy cabbage! Was good, too

Went out to the post office early this morning in full cold-weather regalia, including my Frankenstein snow boots, and felt foolish. Except for the half-block in front of the post office, where there is always a very strong wind, I could have just worn a sweater and my regular shoes. Streets were bare and wet and it was up in the 40's, only snow left is some very sad-looking stuff on the grass. This has been such a strange winter!

[grazhina]

I'm sitting here, checking dollhouse forums and email, because I'm too tired to get up and clean up the kitchen after supper. We ate late, I got sidetracked during dinner, and wanted to get dessert in the oven before the meatloaf.

Speaking of dessert, maybe I can roust myself out of the chair, clean up and have a piece of Cheescake Dream after all. <-----me with a big fork ready for dessert.

[Sherry]

Just got home from our birding meeting, trying to get ready for the bird count in February. I'm so tired, I could sure have stayed at home!

[Muriel]

Loong day again today! Shouldn't be allowed :stereo: 8:45-6:45. Should be early opening and earlier closing or late opening and late closing, not both! To be honest, an extra hour open doesn't sound like much, but it sure does make a difference when you get to 5:45 and have to stay open another whole hour! Standing all day and paying such close attention for 10 hours (minus 30 mins for lunch if i'm not disturbed, which is rare) is tough! Well two days there this week might mean none next week. Here's hoping!

Showed some pictures of Bullwinkle Terrace to my colleague and she's delighted and it looks just right she says! always nice to know what you're doing is going in the right direction. Gotta do some wall painting next, think I'll do that tomorrow after work. That'll make a big difference. Also then gotta find some carpet material for the floors and order the inside trim.

[Syphon79]

It's about 5:56 AM here in DC. Just got word from the maintenance folks at the apartment complex that the furnace in our building is not working. Management is calling the gas company (they think that's the problem) and the maintenance folks are going around checking with residents if they need a space heater.

Going to have to work from home -- not comfortable leaving a space heater on unattended, and BF and I are worried about our pet ratties being in a cold room. Especially our new addition Shallot -- she just came home from the shelter last night.

On the bright side = can spend more time at the forum and maybe do some "mini-ing" in between work orders.

[havanaholly]

Quiet day cussing at the iso Fairfeield.

[Sherry]

Long day yesterday. DS2's Jeep had a hose break on him, thought the engine had blown up for a second. Apparently it really blew! So he called DH to come after him and they spent the afternoon fixing the hose and replacing a relay to the fan. DIL2 had a blow up with a girl at the dr. office where she works because she finally refused to do the other girl's work for her. So we took them all out to dinner. Figured they needed a little pampering.

Our friend I mentioned was coming-he had his electric chair on the lift on the back of his car, covered with a tarp. On the way, the tarp blew off, so Mike pulled over. It was out in the highway, so he checked both ways and started after it. He swears there was no vehicle in sight. About the time he got to the tarp, he hears someone coming, looks up and sees a truck headed toward him. Now, Mike can barely walk, but started toward the side of the road as fast as he could. The truck never even slowed down. It came close enough to him to blow Mike off the road and into a ditch. Thank God, someone else saw it and stopped to help Mike. He was banged up pretty bad, and is back home now. But I worry about his frame of mind. He has been really depressed since this disease advanced to the point that he had to use the chair. He's always been a very self sufficient person, so this dependency on other people is wearing him down.

Anyway, we didn't have company last night, so I got some work done on the painted lady. it's starting to resemble a house!

[KathieB]

Good lord, Sherry ... that's too scary for words! Sounds to me as if Mike is pretty self-sufficient if he can go out to dinner with his chair. I understand his depression, but please help him see how many things he can do despite the illness rather than focus on what he can't do because of it.

[Sherry]

Actually he was on his way here from Austin, about a 6 hr drive. He's always been able to do that without problems before. But he had to have some surgery before Christmas on a broken foot and it seems like he hasn't recovered mentally from that. We have been trying to get him to move home here, where his kids are and where we are, to take care of him. Maybe now that he knows it's dangerous for him to travel alone. He and DH are good for each other, when one of them gets depressed about all their ailments and approaching old age.

[Muriel]

Oh how very scary Sherry! So glad that the story didn't have a worse ending.

I bought the carpets for bullwinkle terrace today along with some other bits and pieces so I can make a home cinema scene for the friends that gave me a house just before christmas. Will have to make millions (well ok, a few hundred) of dvd cases to put on a shelf. Going to finish the Bullwinkle windows tonight, then tomorrow can maybe paint the walls, and while it dries start work on the cinema room... well really I think I'll start it tonight while the windows dry! Fun! Have to find a box to make it in though.

[KathieB]

My 12-year-old god daughter, her mother, and sister are on their way over her for help in making a Chinese dragon costume. I'd really rather mini, but since they're bringing supper with them, I couldn't really say no. Not that I'd say no anyway ... you know how that goes!

[Syphon79]

Today is my mother's birthday, so BF and I will be joining the rest of my family to eat at her favorite buffet restaurant. After that, stop at my sister's apartment for mocha cake and coffee. Depending how much food we ate, BF suggested maybe to head home if one of us starts feeling ill.

Tomorrow will be taking down the holiday decorations, and starting on the Winston and Rye. Hopefully that'll pan out.

[havanaholly]

DH had to go to Lowe's for items to repair some of The Jerk's destruction, so I got a roll of iron-on white birch veneer (in case my roll & a half of red oak ever shows up) and a two-pack of 1/16" drill bits. I mean, one can't waste a perfectly good trip to Lowe's! They have the window-dressing sample cards with the mini shades; I have GOT to finish the Fairfields and put Mildred into dry-fit, now, so I can count windows (and where).

[Sherry]

Muriel, you could print out some old Movie posters to decorate the outside of your box. Sounds like quite a project!

Yes, we are so thankful Mike is just sore today.

Went after groceries since the kids will come over for lunch after church tomorrow, and rented a couple of movies to watch tonite. Now I'm back working on the Painted Lady LR floor.