Weekend Wrapup

Bright enjoying his sister's skirt

Thanks to those of you who prayed for me and an affected adoptive family last week when I posted. Sometimes adoption comes with some pretty major disappointments. Things are better now. The family is healing.

This weekend has been my favorite type of weekend. With the exception of a Friday night trip to Lowe's we stayed home all weekend and were NOT lazy! Staying home all weekend--par for the course. Being lazy--yep, that too. But not this weekend! This weekend we were active and made progress on our ever-in-need-of-help house and yard.

We mowed...we weeded...we de-trashed (with 3 kids oh how the trash in the yard piles up!)...we weeded some more. We even planted some annuals out in the front! When we moved into this house an elderly couple had lovingly created a magnificent garden and yard in the back. It was beautiful! Problem was, I do not have a green thumb and had no idea how to care for the garden. Plus we were a little busy the last few years. =0) The former owners would DIE if they saw the backyard now. And what's funny about that is our backyard definitely looks better right now than it has since we moved here 2.5 years ago! We figure we're going to live here for a long time so we might as well take our time improving the yard. Almost everything the other people left has died, so we have mostly dirt-filled beds with a few survivors of the old family garden here and there.

Inside we...vacuumed, cleaned some carpets, went through and thinned out all of our MANY blankets, got all of the dishes done (yes I count that as an accomplishment in this house!), counters and stove washed (another accomplishment), all of the laundry folded and put away, swept, washed our comforter and bed linens, and cleaned up our bedroom a bit (it needs a lot more work).

Can you say...THE PARENTS ARE COMING TO SPEND THE WEEKEND NEXT WEEKEND! ;-)

Have you all heard of FreeCycle? If not, I just have to plug it. It's become a cool "side" thing in my life. Basically, the goal is, instead of throwing something in the trash, you GIVE it to someone else who might have a use for it. Tonight we had a 39 gallon bag filled with old blankets. In the past I may have just shoved them into the garage or put them on the curb. But I took a chance and offered them on FreeCycle (for our Tulsa area). I didn't really think there would be much interest. NOT! Within 5 minutes I had 5 people who wanted the blankets. I will put them on my porch and they will be gone to a new home tomorrow. I didn't even wash them (and told the freecycle folks so). I posted some boys' clothes last week and got over a dozen responses. At the same time, I got a brand new plastic food storage system last Friday because someone else didn't want it. We've also gotten a free bed, mattress, and bedding over the months. I've seen computers, TVs, and all sorts of furniture posted. And it's all FREE. It's against the rules for there to be any charge.

Check it out: http://www.freecycle.org/

Eric's dialysis kept us home from Church today (sometimes it takes hours longer than it's supposed to), so we spent extra time playing with the kidlets, and reading from the book of Samuel.

Oh! One of my biggest accomplishments for the weekend? I wrote thank you notes! Yes mom--I did! I know I was a HORRIBLE person and never got around to them for wedding or baby showers...and I only occasionally send them for anything else, but I wrote NINE thank you notes to donors who did a recent fundraiser for AAI's GRACE Fund. It was horrible (writing them, not saying thankyou)! I just hate that task! LOL! But I appreciate those donations and want them to keep coming so I was a good girl mom--I wrote my thank you notes! ;-)

Anita