I am having an aggravating day. Not one specific reason. Several small ones. Most about Tanner and Ty sized:). I have had kids clinging to my legs a good percentage of the day. If I shut the door for a moment they stand there knocking. For whatever reason, they must play within 36 inches of me at all times so I feel like I have been followed by a cyclone. Both are down for naps now….I am going to relish in some mommy time and hope they don’t wake up early:). Young one’s are an incredible amount of work and I have been feeling like a parent failure this week. When you have to get after them for the same thing over and over who is really the problem? Yep – the mother. Apparently, I am not being as consistent as I should be or I wouldn’t have to repeat myself. I get so busy that it’s easier to make threats to do something some days but the truth is, those threats come back to bite because they get worn out really quick and you ended up in a cry wolf situation – no one listens to a thing. So today I have been trying diligently to back up what I say. Hope it helps so I can keep my fragile sanity:).

We have had somewhat of a crazy week but I am grinning thinking of the chaos of it – the things memories are made of. Our cousins, Ray and Janelle Zuercher (from Olathe, Kansas if anyone is wondering:), came to visit with their three kids – Rachelle, Jarred, and Kaitlynn. They have been bebopping around the southwest and even got to see a snow capped Grand Canyon. Anxious to see those pictures. Anyhow, in order to accommodate our family we decided that Ray and Janelle would stay in the guest suite at my mom and dad’s and all three kids (18, 15, and 13) would stay at our house. It would have been more practical for them to have the kids stay at my parents too but then Rob and or Dusty would have had to have done a major spring clean (more like remodel) on their bedrooms and temporarily vacated and Sweetie thought that pigs would likely fly before she witnessed that event (but she is still HOPING).

Fate this week has just not been in our favor. First, the Zuercher’s flew in on a red eye Monday night. Earlier in the day though a minor crisis occurred. There is a chemical plant within a couple of blocks of my parents that tests Jet evacuation seats. They had an explosion and the whole neighborhood was asked to voluntarily evacuate. While technically the evacuation WAS voluntary, the neighborhood was told that if they did not chose to leave during their window of opportunity, they were going to get locked in for possibly a couple of days. Few people wanted that so my parents and Grammy had to relocate to my Aunt’s house. This was all over the news by the way, you may have even seen it in your state. As a side point, this event made my dad furious and mom and I were a little concerned when he managed to get interviewed by about 10 stations:). For the last couple of years the community has been asking the city NOT to renew the plants lease because this is not the first time a chemical explosion has occurred – they got evacuated before. The city ignored the community and renewed the lease anyway. The clip of dad that the news aired was of him saying “The city has declared this plant safe. Does THIS look safe to YOU?” 🙂 See where I get my exhortations from:)

Anyhow, mom and I brainstormed and decided that everyone would stay with us. Ray and Janelle could have our bed, the girls could have Tanner’s bunk bed, Jarred could have the sofa bed, and Jim and I would sleep on an air mattress with Tanner in Ty’s room. So Jim set about on a hunt for the air mattress in the garage. This was a big project considering the state of our unorganized newly moved garage:). He found it right as I got the phone call that the air was clear and the evacuees could return from exile. Plan A back in motion. Jim and I simply grinned.

All was good until Tuesday. The Zuercher’s left at about 10:00 AM on Tuesday morning to drive to the Canyon and other places and while they were gone we had a home warranty person out (we have a couple of window issues that need to be fixed). Over the weekend Phoenix had tons of rain AND SNOW too! It was incredible. All the surrounding mountains just beyond our neighborhood range were totally snow capped. I have lived here for over 25 years and never saw that. Anyhow, all the rain revealed a roof leak. The good news first – the rain damage was covered under the home warranty plan. The bad news – my MIL had just finished custom faux painting Tanner’s room and the paint was literally rippling down the wall in spots due to rain damage and at this particular moment we have two inside walls removed out of Tanner’s room with a huge blower in there trying to blow it dry. Sigh…….

So…we now have Tanner’s room quarantined which removes the usage of the bunk beds so back to the room switcheroo again. Too funny. Tanner and Ty are going to love this change of plans though – they will find it enormously fun for mommy and daddy to be sleeping on the floor in TY’s room. (No worries though – I love to camp and I love air mattresses so we’ll have fun with this).

Also on a humorous note, when the work crew was out examining the walls I expressed my frustration about the custom paint job destruction. One of the workers looked at me and said (seriously) “Ya…isn’t that called a Faux Pas paint job?” My MIL was with me at the time and we cracked up! (The word is Faux paint not Faux Pas – Faux Pas is defined as a blunder). I ended up agreeing with the man – the paint job did indeed turn out to be a Faux Pas:)!!!! As I didn’t correct him, he is probably going to continue using that term but it was too funny so I’ll let someone else educate him.

So what have I gotten done on the house? Well nothing entirely but lots of things partially:). The guest bathroom is missing a chair rail and Ty’s room is missing a fan and closet organization so those two rooms are the closest to being done. Every other room is still partially completed.

As if the paint crisis wasn’t aggravating enough we are also in over our heads with our breakfast table. We made the decision to buy a more expensive all wood breakfast table and move our current table to the formal dining room. We chose to stain it ourselves to save money. What a mess. I won’t go into the details but it feels like we will NEVER finish this project due to continual setbacks. My family doesn’t want to hear “no we aren’t available this evening – we are stuck in the garage working on the chairs” one more time. Such is life….

This is getting tedious and boring isn’t it? I will quit writing about the mundane now so as not to bore the socks off ya. I do want to ask a silly question though totally unrelated to this posting. When I was pregnant with Tanner I got very severe hyperemesis (threw up all day everyday for 4 months – did better during second trimester and then started throwing up again in the 3rd trimester). I would regularly break blood vessels in my face and eyes from so much vomiting – totally yucky (domestic adoption looked VERY appealing those days and still does:). Anyhow, ever since I have had a very sensitive gag reflux. I am noticing that if I try to hold anything in my mouth when I run out of hands, like a pen or a hanger when I am hanging clothes, I’ll start to gag. Is that weird? It’s really been bugging me lately and I wonder if anyone else has this strange little disorder.